hello and welcome to spotlight: 11 months of relentless israeli bombings have killed at least 41,000 palestinians, tens of thousands of bombs have been dropped on the besieged gaza strip, civilian infrastructure is almost entirely destroyed, humanitarian assistance just trickles in for the palestinians who have been displaced multiple times from from one refugee camp to another. in the occupied west bank, the regime's hunger for palestinian lands has been insatiable. iof raids, settler attacks and illegal settlement constructions have set new records. in spite of, committing all these crimes, the israeli regime only gets more emboldened by the international, by the unconditional political support and military aid from the west, and the silence and inaction of the rest of the international community. stay with us uh as

um we'll be discussing that in tonight's spotlight program with our guests. director of palestine aid ireland, frau huse is joining us from belfast. and we also have author, journalist and producer sakina datu joining us from the british capital, london. welcome to the program, to the uh both of our guests. let's start off with mr. fraus and belfast. uh, over 40,00 palestinians, mostly women and children, have been slaughtered in cold blood since last october, as israeli attacks across gaza continue, the fact that the international community has failed to stop this genocide for almost a full year, is appalling and in my views disgusting, how many more innocent women and children? "aid

workers, doctors and journalists have to be killed before this bloodshed is stopped. well, i think we should start off maybe by saying and stating the figures that have been published by the lancet. the lancet is the newsletter of the british medical association. i believe that they said in march that the figure that they have is over 186, people murdered in this senocidal onslot." i understand the uh ministry of health and gaza can only give the figures that they are able to uh stand over and that is the people who have come to hospital, the people have been certified as dead, but with the ongoing uh starvation of people in the north and many probably as yet uh unfown uh mass graves, i i think that figure of 40,500 is is to be questioned uh talking about how

many people potentially will die so long as the west, that's britain, germany, france, uh, america, australia, canada, the western uh colonial imperialist uh click, so long as i continue to uh unreservedly support israel, i believe that these days will continue until the israely plan, whatever that is comes to uh fruition, and it looks very much as a "they want to destroy gaza, to leave no building standing. we have seen the surgical strikes where they are able to head building in beirot and hit a building, the iranian embassy in damascus, so there are no surgical strikes in gaza, there is an official policy of displacement of 2.2 million people in gaza into less than 10% of the available space without water, without food, without medicine. uh without hospital support uh the

idea is to leave uh gaza as a car park which was free as used previously by some of those in charge uh in israel. "the des will go on unabadted, america curged nothing for the civilian lives in gaza, they curved nothing for the millions that they murdered in vietnam, america carpet bombed cambodia and loush and uh and and vietnam, and what we're watching and what we're witnessing in this genocide is the carpet bombing of the civilian people uh in gaza. israely forces have pulled out of janin following a 10-day offensive uh that was part of a large scale military. campaign that hit other parts of the west bank as well, the assault uh is said to be the biggest in the occupied west bank over the past two decades, give us your assessment of the increased israeli violence in the west bank as the genocide in gaza still ongoing, is this part of the regime's

plan to tighten control over um occupied outs and the alamas compound? i think they've had a control all along. when we see some things that we've witnessed 10 days of raids in genine, you know it's left a brutal destruction. this is part of the collective punishment that israel conducts on the palestinians. mean i was looking into this and water, suwage and 20 kilometers of the road has been destroyed, so basically they have cut off people in chenine to the rest of gaza, of the west bank, so this is a systematic. effort in my view of making a different areas of the west bank as well as gaza unlievable, two fold, one is to ensure that palestinians want to leave themselves, because there is no way that they can sustain life when everything is destroyed, but also

of course this is a forced you know displacement of people, it's ethnic cleansing in terms of them wanting the control of aqsa, i think this is quite a well-known fact, we have seen so many... times ben gavia talk about this, we have seen how every time that you know people go to pray in almaqs aqsa, we have seen the forces, israeli forces going there and killing people, i think you know when we look at what has happened in janine and we are told this hasn't happened in a long time, you see that the gloves are really off, not just in terms of what israel is all about, but in terms of the entire world, whether we're talking about the western countries? or you are talking about the muslim arab countries surrounding, in my view, there is no one now who can claim that really we leave an era where we respect human rights, we live an area where we are obeying international laws, none of these are being held and we can see this very clearly, apart

from the killings, we're talking of you know 4000 or more according to lunset, however the images that we are watching of prisoners, it just is cannot be believe that these are human beings treating other human beings in such humiliating manner, so i mean for me this whole aspect of whether they want al aqsa or why they are doing it, it comes down to the fact that israelies are have lost all sorts of humanity, but not just them, i think a lot of people around the world, a politicians, leaders of the world, upholders of justice, humanity, all of them have really lost. values when it comes to humanity. fraw huves, if the israelis are attempting to forcibly displace palestinians from both uh the gaza strip and the west bank, it potentially means driving palestinians into egypt and jordan. this has all the ingredients for another nakba uh, which apart

from being a war crime, will also have serious repercussions for countries around palestine as well. unpack that for us please. well, i think the best way to look at is really society, which has moved further and further to the rate over the last two decades, is to look at the long-term plan of the zist illegal occupation of palestine, which started around 1902 when the jewish national fund started banging up tracks of land in palestine for zanast jews to emigrate to palestine with the uh proposed idea of creating a jewish state with. in the homeland of palestine, so when you take that as basis for the context of what's happening now, we witnessed 750,00 people being ethnically cleansed in anak, we witnessed, i think it was 350,000 being forced into exile during

the nasa in 1967, and what we're watching is a continuation of the des plan of displacement and replacement of the palestinian people with the... jewish worldwide uh diaspora, so this have most governments are in par for five, possibly 10 years, they have five or 10-year plan for the economy for... jobs, for finance, for securing the state, the israeli state is built on the premise of eventually occupying and controlling all of uh historic palestine, and that's what we're witnessing, it's not a five-year plan, it's not a 10-year plan, it is uh over hundre year plan, it's 123 years uh in the making so far, i think what we're witnessing is attempt to create uh both in gaza. and in the west bank conditions that are uninhabitable and unlivable for the

people of palestine, only way they can force the people out of gaza who stead fastly refuse to leave, even those are suffering from this enforced man-made famon in the north of gaza, the only way they will force them out is uh at the end of guns and the end of tanks and through massacres like they did at uh zem and other places in 1948 in historic palestine, so if they if they try to push the people out into uh the sn, the question is whether or not sisi who in my mind is an american puppet who was put in the power with an american coup when they removed the elected representative and president president m i i think that if they're given enough money or he's personally uh encouraged in some fashion to allow people. move in the gaza and people in the jordan, it's quite possible. mr. datu, uh, looking at the u.s.

complicity in israel's crimes, the us regularly announces that it doesn't want a broader war or any dangerous escalation, but its words and actions are in sheer contradiction. as washington claims its pushing for a cease fire, it continues to provide military, political and financial support to israel, which the regime uses to kill innocent women and children. describe for us this us hypocris. regarding the gaza genocide and israel's regional crimes overall, the us has lost all sorts of credibility you know around the world in a way that i think has never happened before today we've heard of turkish american woman who was killed and she was she was american citizen, if they cannot protect their own citizens um just because of their inequivocal support of israel, this says to you that 'america is not a free country and genuinely i believe that these western countries, uk to

some extent, but definitely in the us, i don't think people realize how much freedom within their own space has been compromised, they are not the politicians, it's not that they don't see what is happening, it's even not that they completely agree with what israel is doing, however they have come to point because they have had support of'. "you know people like the the friends of israel here in the uk. ipec has got so much control over the american congress that even if they want to, they are not able to do anything about it. so you know, today after their own citizen has been murdered, she wasn't even anywhere close to where the the issues were happening, where the you know she was protesting against the illegal settlements, now these illegal settlements, this is not something that me and you are talking." talking about this is according to the international framework that these settlements are illegal, here is an american

woman who wasn't even close to where the the you know protest was happening, but she was killed by israeli forces and what does america do? they have just said that they will investigate america and the uk really western countries in general, germany after what we have seen them standing on the wrong side of history time and again they are doing the same thing. again so in my view the zionist tentacles, the control around the western world is so strong that local ordinary people in this countries do understand that israel on the is on the wrong side, palestinians are the victims, however nobody is able to do anything because there is such a strong control of the zionist entities, this is financially you know in in all different manners, politically people have been placed, zionists have placed their own people in... all key areas and therefore i think you know it's it's almost like in some way we are also a hostages to what is

happening because we cannot convince our governments to do anything significant. sure he's talking about focusing on the us uh it's facing widespread protests and demonstrations for its complicity in uh the gaza genocide most notably at university campuses which are going to gain steam again as the new semester starts how american politicians just ignore how displeased americans are with this war and with their tax dollars being sent to fund this genocide. most american and western politicians and general haven't even second guess their support for these radies? yes, well, i think first of all, recently talking about apac in america, they are boasting that they have just spent 100 million dollars uh in the american elections so far with two months still to go, so it's going to be huge

amount of money being invested by apex, but if we consider that before october 7th, 2023, the american tax. was sending the israely state th billion dollars, so the american taxpayer sends $3 billion dollars to help provide a free education, free healthcare and social housing for people in israel, when you cannot get free healthcare, free university tuition and free social housing in america, so you send the billion dollars to america and they spend 100 billion plus in order to buy members of congress. members of the senate and to influence the presidential race uh we know that baiden is an avanist uh he's actually said before that if israel didn't create uh sorry if israel wasn't an existence uh they would have to create it in order to maintain american hegemonic control within west asia when it comes to oil and gas pipelines i remember one of the first things

that was done in afghanistan after the american lead war on afghanistan. was a gas pipeline that went through afghanistan, this was the very first uh uh the first uh law enacted by uh carse uh when he became the american poppet in afghanistan, so it's about control of resources, oil, gas, suis canal and other uh things that are important to uh western imperialism, so when you think of donald trump, the thing i think of is that there's photographs. of him with uh epstein, so i just wonder uh, what photographs or what commentary or what emails uh are actually compromising donald trump and his support for the israeli state, so the american senate and the congress is bought, they spent millions of dollars recently trying to unseat pro-palestinian uh independent or uh

democratic democratically elected democrats and congress, so they're buying political power uh through financial power and that's been witnessed all over europe uh and and other uh western five five countries. so to after close to year, the palestinian resistance continues to fight back hard inside gaza, which marks the great failure for israel's military campaign on the ground. what does that say about the steadfastness of the resistance? um, palestinians i think are cut from a cloth that does does not share with anyone else around the world. if we was to see the kind of resistance that we are seeing in palestine, in other places, in egypt, in turkey, in the us, in uk, this world would have been a very different place. i don't know where they get the strength from, but i can only see that the trust in god is what really gives them the strength to

keep resisting. now when we talk about resistance, here are even talking about resistent in western countries these days has become issue because there is huge crackdown on the media here, recently we have seen sarah wilkinson, you know under hause, we have seen richard medhurs, we witnessed clive mensis, there's lot of other other you know journalists who are being constantly threatened for speaking out, speaking out and just talking about basic resistance, now this resistance is according to the international law, you know they have every all people have a right of self determination. so when we talk about resistance we are not necessarily talking about hamas or we're talking about ordinary people and this is because they are occupied, israel is a colonial power and therefore you know resistance is is something that is they are allowed to resist, i really i really look at those mothers you know and think that god has sometimes you you can lose

trust in god, sometimes you can watch what is happening and really wonder where is god when people are being subjected to these kind of atrocities, but on reflection in my view, i think the people of palestine when you watch the resistance of those mothers, those children, it it is to awaken the rest of us, maybe the rest of us around the world are so infiltrated into this material world where it is constantly about getting more and more and more and they are there to awaken our conscious and and to really make us question ourselves i i just want to you know ask the the masses, particularly masses in egypt or those students who are you know in in the us, yes they have shown us a way, but where is everybody else, we or... already see that a process such as elections is no more free, people are supposed to be in a democracy, it's the people who are supposed to be deciding their leaders, but in reality all

elections are bot. this is a time for the resistance such as that of palestine to spread around the people the world, people who believe in peace, who believe in humanity all around the world, they have to take example of these students that we've seen in university campuses, we need to see this spread around the world. to end this shame that is upon the world today. for the israelis have taken to the streets again to protest benyamin netanyahu and his far right cabinets handling of this war. netanyahu stands accused of systematically obstructing the gaza ceasefire for his political and personal gains. is that how you view it as well that netanyaho is prolonging this war just to keep his head above water? well, first of all, i could adddress the fact that... there someone's caaned up to 500,000 israelies on the streets of tel aviv and other towns and cities uh calling for sess fire, they're not calling for sess fire, what

they want are the remaining captives released uh and brought back home to israel and then they don't occur if gaza is turned into a car park afterwards, after 11 months of genocide, they are not on the streets calling for an end to the war, they're not calling for an end of the... genocidal purge on gaza, they are not complaining about the people in the west bank who are being murdered or the 10,000 detainees, actually in the kenness, not that long ago, they were debating whether or not, according to their religious values that it is legal or moral to rip men and women, to gang, rip them, the most vulnerable people in the world, people you can't decide what time to go up in the morning, what time eat, what time to exercise, what time to read a book, they are... totally conditioned and controlled within the israeli prison system, these people are being brutalized, starved, beaten, tortured and ripped, and there's no one in tel aviv on the streets calling for

this to come to an end, what you're witnessing is the uh entitlement i would describe it of the uh the chosen people who believe that the lives of the captives are above the lives of palestinian men, women, children and newborn bebes, uh, they cur nothing, for the gazans, nothing for the palestinians in the west bank. the soul concern is for the captives that they want brought home. the opposition want netanyahu out purely because they want to get in the power, but israeli society has moved so far to the right, that i believe if they had elections in the next six months, you would see the settler movement gain more power, more influence and more positions, and you may see bengiver or smoothridge or someone else of that elk because. coming the leader uh within the caneset in a hung parliament, so it's all you talk about american hypocrisy around these fires, what we're witnessing in tel aviv is a hypocrisy of fascist right-wing

society who voted into power yet again netanyahu, the war criminal for 20 years with blood on his hands of innocent palestinians, they voted in smoke bridge, they voted and ben giver, nahu wants to stay there as long as possible, i think he... has the dream that he will be the israeli leader who finally settle the palestinian question, and i think that's part of the reason why he wants to stay in power, he wants to leave hero regardless of what the people feel now, if he can win in gaza and he can destroy the west bank, he will see himself as hero. all right, that's all the time we have for tonight's show, thank you to uh director of palestine ade ireland fraues joining us from belfast and author, journalist and producer sakina datu speaking. tous from the british capital, london, a special thanks to you our viewers for staying with us tonight spotlight. it's good night for now and see you next time.

this is about people who got silenced but kept fighting. supervision and controlling. of freedom of speech only comes up when you're criticizing israel, 45 palestinian journalists behind israeli bars at the moment, they warn students that if they remain here they will be arrested. this is about the voices of palestine.

the siege of gaza must end. we're coming back and we'll keep coming back until palestine is free.

يا ابو خضور ولا يرجعلك. israel conducts fresh deby attacks on gaza where the overall death tool from the israeli aggression nears 40,900. yemenese once again take to the streets across the country and a show.