 It's been 17 days since Israeli occupation forces continued their bombing of the Gaza Strip since Hamas launched Operation Al-Aqsa Flood on the 7th of October on Sunday when we didn't come to you on daily debrief. Over 400 people were killed in attacks just on that day alone in what's been described as the heaviest single day of bombing on the besieged Strip. Operations have also moved to the West Bank where close to 100 people have been killed and hundreds over a thousand have been arrested since October 7th. We'll talk about all of this. Of course, it's our lead story as it has been consistently on daily debrief since October 7th. We'll also ask Abdul, who's covering Gaza for us today, what exactly is happening on the aid front and where is the rest of the world. Our show today concentrates completely on events in Gaza and I'll be joining us later on, where she will be talking about solidarity rallies across Europe, particularly massive rallies held in London and Brussels, the European capital as it were. Salams, you're watching Daily Debrief brought to you as always by People's Dispatch before we go any further. Take a second and subscribe to our YouTube channel. And as I was saying earlier, it's been 17 days of continued bombing airstrikes on going against various targets. The Israeli Defense Forces said that they get over 300 targets supposedly all associated with Hamas in Gaza. 60 people have been killed so far at the time of going to recording on Monday on Sunday. Reports indicate that as many as 400 Palestinians lost their lives in the strikes. Abdul joins us today after a few days to and he was regularly covering West Asia as well as Palestine for People's Dispatch. Abdul, good to have you back on the show. First of all, as we have been giving our viewers an update of events since we last spoke, we of course don't have a show on Sunday, so you have the entire weekend to cover for us. Well, there are many things which have happened in all these three days, including one of the most intensive days of bombing on Sunday. As per the reports from the ground, it seems that this was the, as you rightly pointed out, the introduction that more than 300 targets inside the Gaza Strip were kind of bombed by Israeli warplanes and more than 400 people were killed all across the Gaza Strip, apart from the fact that this is the day Israeli occupation chose to also intensify aggression against the Palestinians in the occupied West Bank. So it seems that Israel is refusing to understand the central question which Palestinian resistance has raised ever since they launched Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, saying that the repeated violations of human rights in the occupied territories need to be co-op. Israel refuses to learn that. And apart from committing a genocide in the Gaza, they continue to have the similar kind of repressive practices which they had before the Gaza offensive started earlier this month. So this is one, there are also reports that it seems that the the confrontation which Israeli regime was not kind of claiming on the northern borders with Lebanon has also intensified during the weekend. Saturday was one of the days when the largest number of, you can say, clashes between the Hezbollah and the Israeli forces were recorded. More than six Hezbollah fighters were killed. And Hezbollah also targeted different centers in Israel. It seems that the Chinese were claiming Chinese representative in the in West Asia basically said that they want ceasefire at any cost and they are ready to do whatever is required to be done to achieve that ceasefire, primarily to prevent the war to become reasonable. If you see, and that is a real threat, it's emerging. So apart from Hezbollah kind of intervening on behalf of Palestinians, on behalf of Lebanese grievances, there is also another regional force in Yemen, Ansarullah, the Houthis, they have also kind of claimed that if Israel continues to pursue its genocidal policies inside occupied Gaza, they will also start targeting the Israeli warships in the Red Sea. So that seems that there are multiple theaters which kind of emerging in the last, which has emerged in the last three days at least and that basically puts the risk of the war in Gaza becoming a regional war. And that basically is one thing. The one last thing about when it comes to update is that it seems that the ground offensive with Israeli army was kind of claiming to kind of start earlier, before the weekend, it seems it has been delayed for various reasons, apart from the fact that the Israeli army does not seem to be confident about kind of sending the troops inside the Gaza yet, despite bombing the territory so heavily, despite war and giving repeatedly warling against the international law for the residents, including the hospitals where the thousands of Palestinians have been admitted due to the injuries created by the war and all, despite all of that, it seems that Israel is not confident enough at this moment to kind of start its ground offensive and it has been delayed again. So the bombing has continued on Monday as well, as you rightly pointed out, and it is not 60 by the way, as it is said that the figure of the death, the casualties is increasing hour by hour, so more than 200 people have been killed since the morning today, sorry, morning on Monday. And it seems the numbers are going up every hour because the bombing continues at the time when we are talking about it. Yeah, absolutely, thanks for pointing it out. And again, also for our viewers, it's impossible for us or anybody to actually have very long-dated numbers between the Palestinian authorities themselves, the Ministry of Health and others, who are taking out these numbers are engaged in relief work, in rescuing people from the rubble where these air strikes hit, they have very thin resources and often it takes hours, if not longer, to get people out. And only then can any figures be determined once families report people as missing and families manage to contact authorities and such. So numbers continually being updated, but we know for sure that over 5,000 Palestinians have now 5,000 cousins, that is, have been killed in Israel's offensive since October 7th. Abdul, just sort of proceeding on the updates front, what are you hearing about humanitarian aid coming in the last reports I saw? And again, these might not be updated numbers, but a handful of trucks have been allowed in, which those who are actually doing the work in the distribution says not even 1% of the daily requirement of 1 million or so residents require. Exactly. Of course, the aid started has started has started flowing in into the Gaza Strip from the Rafa border during the weekends against the Friday. It was hoped that the aid will start flowing in, but it did not happen because the repair work was going on. Finally, start late on Friday, early on Saturday. Finally, some aid 20 trucks moved in. And since then there have been there have been reports of another set of trucks moving in on Friday, sorry, on Sunday as well. But as you readily pointed out, this is a very small amount. Despite the fact that a large number of countries have sent aid to Egypt. From there, it is expected to move into Gaza through Rafa border. Israelis are not letting a large number of trucks to move in. And each time there is a movement, there has to be kind of a coordination done with the Israelis that they do not bomb these convis because Rafa, as we all know, has been targeted repeatedly by the Israeli air forces ever since October 7. And it can and Israeli forces have targeted anything which moves across the within the territory of Gaza. So the fear of Israeli bombardment on the aid trucks is one reason apart from the fact that Israelis do not want enough amount of aid to reach. As we all know, there has been a blockade imposed. Of course, Gaza is under blockade for last 16, 17 years. But ever since October 9, Israeli, Israel basically announced that it will not let any aid, whether it is fuel or whether it is food or medicine to reach Gaza until Palestinian resistance forces release all those Israelis which they have taken hostages. And that basically, that ultimatum which was given has continued even now. And because of that, a large number of hospitals in occupied Gaza occupied Gaza have been basically kind of on the verge of seizing their operations. In fact, as per the UNRWA's claim, which was reported earlier, half of the hospitals, there are 20, 20 hospitals around inside Gaza and half of them, around 10 of them have almost stopped functioning because there is no electricity and which basically makes it difficult for the all the equipments which run on electricity to function. But from that, there are also reports that there are not enough medicines, there are not enough beds and all of this is not reaching Gaza on time because of the Israeli restrictions imposed. So this is one, there is also a report that because of the lack of fuel inside Gaza, the only power station which is running on the reserve for the last two weeks may shut down in the coming days and that will be completely blackout in the territory. UNRWA has not been able to distribute food and other material which is already has inside the occupied Gaza because lack of fuel for their trucks within which can move inside the territory to distribute that food, take that food from the go down of UNRWA to the affected people. And because of that lack of movement of the trucks because of the lack of fuel, because the food distribution has been stopped to a very large number of people. And one should remember that UNRWA is holding around half a million Palestinians who have been displaced because their homes were destroyed by the Israeli bombing in Israeli bombing in the last two weeks. So this is, there are many more problems that the Gazans are facing on the ground. It is very difficult to narrate all of them because the complexity of that that situation is so vast. But the one thing which is which one should remember always that it seems that Israelis do not even if they know all these details, they are not willing to kind of concede any ground. They are not willing to allow the people who are suffering on the ground in Gaza, the innocent people to kind of get any kind of relief, because they think this is their only way to kind of win over the the territory in Gaza or kind of quote unquote what they claim to kind of defeat the Palestinian resistance. Abdul, we'll talk a bit more about that later on also with Anna in terms of how the resistance on a political front is shaping up around the world as well and we've touched on it previously. One aspect or one constituency when it comes to when we talk about the whole Palestinian situation, that is a key constituency that we haven't so far talked about on debrief and maybe you're the right person to talk to is the Palestinian prisoners from the West Bank. Now we've talked before about the administrative detention policy and how people are just picked up and held endlessly without charge, without evidence, without any requirements for any of those things. Since October 7th, the numbers of those who have been picked up in the West Bank have also gone up dramatically. I think reports indicating over 1000 people, if 100s sure have been arrested. What is happening on that front in the West Bank as well in terms of showing solidarity with a part of their people who they of course cannot have any other contact with? Well, there are of course not at the level as you saw during the beginning of Operation Alexa Flood. Of course not at that level, but of course there has been resistance. In fact, before the current offensive started, West Bank was the hotbed of all kinds of resistance against the Israeli occupation and that continues to be so. And in fact, that is the reason what I think we've already talked about that how even ever since October 7th, the Israeli offensive apart from bombardments in Gaza, the Israeli occupation forces have started rates, increased number of rates all across the West Bank, fearing that there will be a similar kind of action taken by Palestinians from inside West Bank. And because of that increased operation that they have unleashed, the number of deaths have increased, the number of people who have been wounded more than 1600, the number of people who have been arrested have also gone up. And one should remember, one should know that this at this particular moment, there is no division between Gaza and the West Bank, despite the political differences between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority for a very long time. It seems that the Palestinians at this moment, though are not there is no operation, Alexa flood in West Bank, but there is a similar kind of solidarity and resistance inside occupied West Bank. And that basically, if you see on Sunday, the number of Palestinians who were arrested in one raid was more than 120 by the Israeli occupation forces, because it seems that the Israelis are scared that if the similar outbreaks of resistance happens from the West Bank, it would be difficult for them to, and therefore they are trying to kind of attack the West Bank in what they call the preemptive mode. And that explains the increased number of deaths and other casualties in occupied West Bank. Alright, thanks very much Abdul for all of those updates this Monday on on Daily Debrief. And we hope that you will be joining us now regularly also to help out with the coverage. We're not done, though, with our sort of coverage on off Gaza on Daily Debrief today. Anna now joins us from Zairebana Bracha, the regular on the show. And I'm going to see you. There has been an outpouring of solidarity steadily of course around the world ever since October 7th for four pro-Palestinian protests have been held around the world and in Europe, particularly pressure is mounting on governments who are taking one stand and the people demonstrating something else. Yes, so, you know, for once it's a positive news from that we can see in Europe, because if we look at the headlines in the mainstream media over the last couple of weeks, we've seen them going from the hundreds and hundreds of people rally in support of Palestine to now having thousands of people coming to the streets in support of the Palestinian struggle. Just this weekend, we saw massive, massive rallies in both London and Brussels. In Brussels, there were around 40,000 people gathered in the roundabout just next to the European Union institutions, which is quite symbolic. As we know that the European Union and related bodies have taken a very problematic approach to what's going on in Palestine right now. And this was also a way to show that the will of the people and the feeling of the people is very, very different from what the European Union officers are trying to make it be. So that's one thing that we have seen in Brussels. Another thing which has also been echoed in other countries as well over the past week is that we're seeing a very wide coalition of groups coming together to support to support the people of Palestine and the people of Gaza in particular. There were the group that organized the rally in Brussels was made from trade unions to civil society organizations, but also to local Palestine groups. So it's really you know, bringing together very different people. And what we have heard from activists on the ground is that the atmosphere and the feeling coming out of these protests is very positive, not only because it's this kind of great moment which shows that the people of Europe stand behind the people of that support the people of Palestine, but also because it has not been the feeling that it's a one time thing. So it's something that's essentially showing that this is something here to stay and that it's going to grow in order to pressure the European European officers to take to take a stand against Israel's actions. And this is a very similar to what we have seen in London as well, where the rally was even more massive. So it was around 100,000 people in London over the weekend. It was the second rally of the sort. And of course, you know, we talk about London, we talk about Brussels. It has to be said the similar rallies, maybe smaller are taking place in many other cities in the UK, in Belgium, in all across Europe. But essentially the one in London was significant because it kind of brought together the shared demands that people across Europe have put in front of their government when this is concerned. And that's immediate ceasefire, pushing Israel to allow for an immediate supply of medicines, of food, of water, of everything that we know people are missing right now. And of course, then also to push for investigation into Israeli war crimes that and and acts of genocide that we have seen happening over over the past weeks. So all these people together are kind of building up towards what can be what can be called a shared perspective, at least a perspective that that many left groups in Europe share, and that are essentially trying now to find ways to push it on on their local local level. And what sort of response has this received from those in positions of power? And I'm because London significant also because we saw Rishi Sunak among the first and most visible of Western leaders to visit Israel and and demonstrate his solidarity with and of course Israel and reiterate Israel's right to defend itself without making any real substantial moves to ensure the kind of humanitarian relief that you were talking just now. Well, yeah, so I mean, it's always difficult to talk about Europe in this context because it never makes sense. And of course, if you're being reasonable, so what we have seen as a response from the from the governments of Europe has been in some way an attempt to limit the demonstrations, the pro-Palestinian demonstrations that we are seeing. We have talked about it also here on the show before, so we have seen Germany and France very early on taking a very hard stand towards it. France at one point just just banned all the all the Palestinian protest or at least try to do so. It is now revising requests on a case by case basis, which means that some might some rallies might happen, others might not. But essentially, a general response was that the pro-Israeli rallies are not affected at all while the pro-Palestinian ones are under heavy scrutiny in one or in the other way. This includes a very strong presence of the police forces when the rallies are taking place. But it's also extending to some some quite problematic things, which border with impetition of free speech. So, for example, you know, some governments and some police forces have had a problem with with chanting free Palestine during the protests, interpreting it as a call to you know, for as anti-Semitic and that was one one of the interpretations. Of course, the official interpretations of that as also illustrated by some more recent court practices is that, of course, chanting free Palestine on a pro-Palestinian rally should not be a problem at all. But again, their interpretation went into into that direction. We have also seen in Germany again examples of education authorities trying to ban stickers or posters reading free Palestine. So essentially, it's quite a heavy revisionist movement that we're seeing that we're seeing in Europe. And what's most worrying is that, you know, many people who have been active in the Palestinian cause for a long time, especially in Germany, are telling about how they're scared of of providing a different opinion of speaking up in support of of Palestine because they're afraid of what might happen that they're afraid that they might get persecuted, that they might get attacked. So that's kind of an overview of what we're seeing right now. Yeah. And definitely, social media also playing a major, major role in that revisionist movement, Anna, that you were talking about. And something perhaps we can get into in further detail later on in the week. But we are we are pretty much at the end of almost a half hour. So we leave it there. From Anna, myself and the entire team at People's Dispatch. Thank you very much for watching this episode of the Daily Debrief for details on all of these stories, of course, and all of the other work we do, as always, head to our website, People's Dispatch dot org and give us a follow on the social media platform with your choice. We'll be back tomorrow. Until then, thanks for watching.