 Gaza under attack. The second live coming to you from People's Dispatch and Globetrotter and Vijay. I'm here with Zoe Alexandra. I'm very happy to be with you. Although I wish we were here in different circumstances. Let's start Zoe right with the situation in Gaza right now. The UN Palestinian Agency has made an announcement saying that they simply will run out of fuel, perhaps by tomorrow. That means by Thursday, the 26th of October, Anarva will not have fuel. Why is this important? See, there's been trucks coming in, very few trucks coming in from across the Rafa crossing between Palestine and Egypt at the Gaza point. Trucks have been coming in, but the trucks deposit their goods and leave. It is Anarva trucks that have been picking up those goods, the UN Palestine Agency, carrying them to depots. 600,000 Palestinians have taken refuge in UN compounds, 600,000 out of 2.3 million Palestinians in Gaza. So if Anarva trucks run out of fuel and can't carry necessary food stuffs in, that's going to be very complicated. Hospitals have said that because of the lack of electricity, they've been trying to run on generators. They're running the incubators on generators, emergency rooms on generators, surgical facilities on generators. The generators are going to run out of fuel. Now, fantastically, the Israeli government has said the reason they're not going to allow fuel into Gaza is that they argue Hamas, one of the Palestinian factions has stockpiled fuel. So Lieutenant Colonel Peter Lerner, a spokesperson for the Israeli military, said, we know that Hamas has stockpiled fuel extensively. We know they are utilizing it for their ventilation in the tunnel system. We know that they are utilizing it for various different terrorist attacks. Now, interestingly, on Twitter, the Israeli military has shown photographs of the stockpiled fuel, apparently stockpiled by Hamas. Fascinatingly, the Israelis are bombing every conceivable target inside Gaza, bombing houses, bombing people's homes, bombing the home of human rights defender Raja Shirani, but they're not bombing these apparent stockpiles of fuel. Curious business, this game of cat and mouse of narratives being trying to be controlled. Here's the Palestinians inside Gaza, unable with no fuel to have hospitals running, unable to get food to the various UN locations where 600,000 people are sheltered. All of that unable to happen. Israelis are saying we know that Hamas is stockpiling fuel, but despite the fact that they're bombing people out of their homes and sending them to the UN shelters, they're not bombing the fuel depot. This makes it seem slightly suspicious. Maybe there are no fuel depots. Maybe Gaza is running out of fuel. Maybe Israel is continuing its policy of collective punishment of the Palestinians of Gaza. I'm going to come back to that because that has something to do with what the UN Secretary General has said. But before we come back to Gaza, Zoe, why don't you shift gears? Because this is not just a war against the Palestinians in Gaza. This is a war that the Israelis are prosecuting against the Palestinians even in the West Bank and in East Jerusalem. What's been happening on that other side in the West Bank? Well, I'll just quickly say before talking about the West Bank that I saw an incredible photo from Gaza-based journalist, a Palestinian journalist in Gaza, saying you can stop the fuel, but the sunlight will keep shining. And he posts a picture of these solar-powered battery-charging banks where he's charging his devices. And I think it's truly just incredible, the bravery and courage of the Palestinian journalists, photographers, videographers who are every day at risk of being killed in these airstrikes and continuing to inform the world, continuing to report and continuing to shine a light on this brutality and this atrocity. So I think that's exactly right. The sunlight will continue and the people will continue resisting in all the ways possible. And as you said, yeah, in the West Bank, I think it's crucial to highlight that attacks continue against Palestinians there. Yesterday, there was an unprecedented escalation after resistance fighters repelled and attacked by Israeli occupation forces outside the refugee camp in Janine. They launched an airstrike. An airstrike in the West Bank, just want to repeat that. We're not talking about Gaza, we're talking about the West Bank. And killed six people. There's already over 100 people that have been killed in the West Bank since October 7th. And an important fact to highlight is that before October 7th, the number of Palestinians that were being held in Israeli prisons, Palestinian political prisoners was over 5,000 with 1,000 of them being held in administrative detention. Today, that number has over doubled at 10,000 Palestinian political prisoners, people being held for anyone that has any familiarity with how this process works. We're talking about children, we're talking about adolescents being held in these prisons, military courts where people are forced to sign documents confessing to crimes in Hebrew when they might not even know what they're saying. Being held in Israeli prison, I think as many people have pointed out, is the equivalent of being held hostage because it has nothing to do with any crimes that you've committed. It is for the crime of being Palestinian, it is the crime of throwing a stone for resisting in any way possible to the atrocious attacks against the people. So over 10,000 political prisoners being held in Israeli prisons, the majority of them from the West Bank, but also people from Gaza as well, important to highlight. And also before the attacks, before October 7th, this year was already the most violent year against Palestinians in terms of the number of people killed by Israeli forces, which was over 200, which was a number that broke records since the early 2000s. So this number, not only over 6,000 people who have been killed in the air raids in Gaza over the past several weeks, the 100 that have been killed in the West Bank, this was already the most deadly year for Palestinians with the highest level of violence against them from Israeli forces. So this continues. People continue to resist in the West Bank. There have been a number of marches of national strikes that have taken place by Palestinians within the West Bank. They continue to resist and they continue to demand a cease in the bombings against the population in Gaza. This is a crucial area where we're seeing also the Palestinian Authority cracking down on people protesting. So it's a dynamic situation and the escalation with the air raid yesterday is certainly concerning and we're going to be continuing to follow. Is that going to be a trend that increases? Is that a one-time thing? But I think what it shows is that Israeli military is growing increasingly desperate. They can't, if their response to a ground repel from Palestinian resistance fighters is to respond with airstrike, they seem to not have much confidence in their ability to do this otherwise. We're going to come back to the so-called ground invasion that has been threatened in fact from almost the 7th of October. But I want to return to this issue of the humanitarian crisis because it is something that should plague sensitive people around the world. On Tuesday, October 24th, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, a person not always out there saying difficult things, was forced by circumstance. I mean, dozens of UN officials, people who work for the UN have been killed in this bombing in Gaza. I mean, I remember during 2014, the Israeli military bombed the UNICEF office in Gaza. At the time, there was nobody at the office but they destroyed the office. Well, a number of UN officials have been killed in Gaza during this particular bombing. Now, Antonio Guterres made a statement. He's been very concerned about the cutting off of various supplies, food, water, electricity and so on. And he accused Israel on Tuesday, the 24th of October of violating humanitarian law. This is a very serious matter that he has raised. Then he said something very interesting. He said that the attacks of October 7th, when Hamas and other Palestinian factions broke the perimeter fence, broke the wall. In fact, the apartheid wall around Gaza and attacked Israeli settlements near the fence. At the time, he said, this did not happen in a vacuum. In other words, Antonio Guterres is refusing to accept the story put out by Tel Aviv, Washington, Rome, Paris, London and so on that somehow history started on October 7th. He said, this did not happen in a vacuum. And then he added that the Palestinians have been subjected to a suffocating occupation. Very strong phrase used by Antonio Guterres. Palestinians have been subjected to a suffocating occupation. What a phrase to have used. Well, the attack on the UN for that has been significant from Tel Aviv. The Israelis have demanded the resignation of Antonio Guterres. That's quite quite a move for the Israelis. I mean, people don't generally demand the resignation of the Secretary General of the United Nations, but the Israelis demanded he resign and then very chillingly and very much in line with what Mr. Guterres said regarding violations of international law. The Israelis have denied access by Martin Griffiths, the UN's humanitarian aid aid chief as a consequence of Antonio Guterres saying there are violations of humanitarian law. The Israelis have denied Martin Griffiths entry into Gaza. That means that the UN's highest official on this cannot enter Gaza. But look, the tide seems to be very much in flux around the same time as Antonio Guterres made these comments. Queen Rania of Jordan, the wife of King Abdullah II was on CNN with Christian Amanpour. Christian Amanpour was trying to push the Israeli storyline about everything starting on October 7th. Why don't you condemn what Hamas did, Hamas is terrorist and so on? Christian Amanpour coming in at that level, very similar to the talking points from the Israeli government. In fact, it's something to be said how CNN and other broadcasters basically are repeating what is being said in Tel Aviv. Well, Queen Rania sounded much more radical than even Antonio Guterres. She didn't just say that there are violations of humanitarian law. She also said that it doesn't start on October 7th, that there's a suffocating occupation. The phrase is Antonio Guterres. But Queen Rania talked about apartheid, apartheid in Israel. And when Christian Amanpour tried to push back and say, listen, that's an Arab talking point. She was very specific. Queen Rania said, no, this is Israeli human rights organizations, that's a lame, for instance. And it is in fact the United Nations, it's human rights watch, it's Amnesty International. All of them, all people who look at the facts have said that Israel is running an apartheid project, that the occupation of the Palestinians way out of bounds. And so this whole structure of the conversation, where in previous wars, caste led, going back to when Israel decided to pull troops out formally from Gaza in 2005 and surround it at the perimeter wall and on the sea wall. And from then onwards, there's been an attempt by the Israeli government to say that Gaza is run by the Hamas. Hamas is a terrorist organization. Anything Israel does, therefore, is part of an anti-terrorist campaign. This doesn't seem to be flying any longer. Here's the Secretary General of the UN, Tuesday the 24th of October saying suffocating occupation by the Israelis of the Palestinians. And then here's Queen Rania of Jordan, a country which has a peace agreement with Israel, where she says there is apartheid-like conditions. There were over a million people in the streets of Amman just a few days after October 7th. And let me tell you, Zoe, it's my feeling that there may be pressure, maybe from Queen Rania to King Abdullah II, there may be pressure on Jordan to at least make a statement saying if this continues, 6,500 Palestinians dead, then let's say 7, 8, 9, 10,000 dead, there may be pressure on the Jordanian monarchy to say, look, we might have to reconsider the peace agreement the peace agreement with Jordan, because the Jordan and Israel peace agreement, which came after Camp David, and before that the agreement with Egypt anchors some of the arrogance of the Israeli government, the feeling that they can do anything to the Palestinians and the great Arab armies of Jordan and Egypt and Syria, not able to respond. I must say, there were some factions from Syria that fired into Israel and Israel bombed Syria yesterday. So these things are all happening is very much a situation of fluidity. I had talked about Christian Amanpour and Queen Rania. Give us a sense of the media narrative wobbling about as it tries to make sense of the situation in Gaza right now. I think the CNN example is great because you see that these outlets that seem determined to really push this, the Israeli talking points to condemn everything that Palestine is doing to make excuses for the killing of over 6,000 Palestinians, they're finding themselves really at odds because the facts on the ground are almost overwhelming in terms of they're not really able to find this justification. And this was really clear when there were two elderly Israeli hostages that were released. One of them gave sort of a press conference and in this press conference, and even at the moment that she was released, there's a video that has been widely circulated where she gives actually a handshake to the Hamas militant who was accompanying her to be released to the Red Cross. This clip has gone viral, but you see mainstream outlets censoring it, not publishing it, showing only the part before that. And then in this press conference, she says that yes, it was horrible, it was really hard being kidnapped, it was violent, it was of course not something someone dreams of every day, it's not a pleasant experience, but she goes on to say but the treatment was decent, they took care of our hygienic needs, they shared food with us, and they treated us overall pretty positively. And this clip was actually censored by most mainstream media outlets, specifically CNN, who when they ran the story about this hostage said, I think the headline was something like it was like hell. And so even the actual words of people who've been held as hostages is being manipulated by mainstream media because they're just unable to spin this, they're just the only kind of resource that they have is to take things out of context, omit and change this narrative. But I think we're seeing more and more of this kind of juxtaposition of the overwhelming amount of people, of journalists, of communicators, sharing on all sorts of platforms on Twitter, on Telegram, on social media, on not hegemonic outlets, sharing what's happening, and then kind of these few outlets, your CNNs, your BBCs, just clinging on to these statements by Israeli officials, by US officials. But more and more, I think as you're saying, the tide is really turning, and they're more and more isolated in what they're saying. It's not only Antonio Guterres, but even mainstream activists who before, for example, might or not have taken a position, I think Israel responded extremely aggressively to the UN Secretary General, but also to young activists who has been one of these centuries, I could say, shining examples of environmental activism, who's really galvanized millions across the globe, Greta Thunberg. She also posted in solidarity with Palestine, demanding an end to the bombings, and she was completely dehumanized and criticized by Israeli officials. We're talking about a young woman who's just said that I think anyone who stands with Greta is standing with terrorism, so we're just seeing the lengths of this desperation, and I think it shows, again, the weakness of their narrative, the desperation they're feeling, and also kind of the incapacity to spin what's happening, to spin the deaths of over 2,000 children. I think this fact has moved people across the world who have children, who have families, see this, and they're unable to turn away. They're unable to say, no, they're all Hamas militants, or this is the fall of Hamas. They're unable to really come up with that response, and I think we're seeing the limits of this propaganda machine, but even so, I mean, even on my own social media where I clearly have not said anything in favor of Israel, every other ad is an Israeli paid propaganda saying release them now, all sorts of different talking points, but they're putting millions and billions of dollars into spreading their message in their sort of incapacity. Well, in the middle of all this, that's the media story that you're telling us. I want to pivot a little bit to the US military's response in this, because look, let's be quite frank. Israel is the principle here. I mean, if there's ever going to be an honest international criminal court looking back at this war, one would expect to see a large number of Israeli politicians in the dock already within Israel. The anger among Israeli citizens with Benjamin Netanyahu is lifted. But of course, Mr. Netanyahu very cleverly has created a government of national unity with Benny Gantz and others. So the whole political class is in the dock, as far as I'm concerned, so to the Israeli Defense Force Chief, so to you have Golan, the Defense Minister, and so on. The United States government, not so far behind, 3.3 billion dollars has been given as aid to Israel, most of it for the military. In a speech, Joe Biden said 105 billion will go to both Israel, Ukraine and other military projects in this time. At least 15 billion dollars, direct aid to Israel to fight the Palestinians, not fight the Palestinians, did I say? How wrong to obliterate the Palestinians? Meanwhile, it's not just money and that's the interesting thing and that's the reason this pivot is important. United States has sent two battle groups, the General Ford and the Dwight Eisenhower, two big battle groups, not only the US government, the British government has also sent battle groups. It was a little chill, Zoe, in reading about the kinds of people, US generals who have been sent by the Pentagon to advise the Israelis. They sent, for instance, Lieutenant General James Glynn. Now to most people, most people have no idea who Lieutenant General James Glynn is, but those of us who covered the war in Syria, the attempt to overthrow the government in Syria will remember that during the campaign called inherent resolve, James Glynn was deeply involved. This was the campaign to remove the Islamic state from the provinces that border between Syria and Iraq. This is in Falooja and Ramadi, but in fact, also on the other side of the border in Syria. Very interesting that at this time in Mosul, in particular, which was the center of the battle, the United States pummeled Mosul. That was the strategy of people like Lieutenant General James Glynn. They pummeled Mosul and they killed about 11,000 civilians. This, by the way, this 11,000 number is a number that has been repeated by newspapers like the New York Times, Washington Post and so on. They generally say a range between nine and 11,000 civilians, Iraqi civilians, were killed in the bombardment of Mosul during Operation Inherent Resolve. And that's what Lieutenant General James Glynn was involved in. Now, the interesting thing is he's supposed to bring the Mosul experience of urban warfare to the Israelis for Gaza, for this situation that people are waiting for. So that means that the United States government is assuming, let's say, the population of Mosul slightly different than the population of Gaza. They're assuming at least 11 to 15,000 civilians will have to die in order to wipe out Hamas from Gaza. Right now, the death toll is 6,500 and the land invasion hasn't begun. That means 15,000 additional people. But wait a minute, wait a minute. I remember Mosul, I remember Operation Inherent Resolve. When the bombing started, families inside Mosul ran into the countryside. They took refuge in the countryside from the bombing. They were able to do that because Mosul is not a garotid city. Where will the Palestinians run when the bombardment intensifies during the land occupation? Mosul is not the same as Gaza. The people in Gaza trapped, they're not going to be able to move. If the United States military believes the Mosul example is a parallel for the Gaza example, they have lost their minds. They don't realize that the people of Mosul ran into the countryside. You can't do that in Gaza. If you're willing to say 15,000 people can die, then you will have to start assuming 30,000, maybe more. This is going to be vicious. If the United States and Israelis cross the perimeter and start a land campaign inside Gaza, tens of thousands of people in addition are going to die. And I think there's also a recognition in Israel, which is why they're holding back. You see, right now the United States saying we're using the time to shore up our defensive units so that when Israel moves into Gaza, the so-called Iranian-backed proxies like Hezbollah and the factions in Syria won't act on Israel and the Iranians won't dare to threaten Israel with missile launches or anything. The US will strike Iran immediately. That's what they're saying. But in fact, the hesitation inside Israel to launch the ground campaign has nothing to do with all this. In my opinion, Israeli generals, Israeli troops don't have the morale for it. They are not willing to lose 5,000, 6,000 troops. There might be 30,000, 40,000 Palestinians might die. But the Israeli army is going to lose a lot of people because the Palestinians are going to fight them one ruin after the other. And I think that's the reason really for the pause. Just to say, in the middle of all this, Zoe, remember in 2011, United States bombed Libya and destroyed Libya, put in place a kind of quizzling government that sits in Benghazi. Do you know what that government has just done? That government has just said every single Western government that backs the Israeli assault on Gaza, all those ambassadors are expelled. Even the quizzling government of Libya has decided to expel ambassadors from Western governments for backing what's going on. I know people's dispatch running a lot of stories. Anything that people can look forward to coming up in the next few days on this or other things? Well, we've been covering a lot of the international mobilizations that have been taking place both in the region, in North Africa, in the US. There's going to be an international day of action on November 4th. I think that cities in cities across the world are going to be massive actions to demand a cessation of the hostilities that Israel stop this bombing. There's also calls in the US, for example, to end all aid to Israel in countries like Morocco. People are taking the streets to demand an end to normalization, which has seen an extremely unpopular move against the aspirations and the desire of the people. In Tunisia, for example, they're actually calling for a bill to criminalize normalization so that this cannot happen. I think it'll be a really, really important day. People, I think we can say safely that hundreds of thousands of people across the world will be on the streets that day. An important show. And what's really important to highlight that for the past couple of weeks, we have seen an unprecedented level of solidarity, of mobilization and support of Palestine. There's always protests. There's always rallies anytime that is really a tax Gaza, tax Palestine. But I think that this has been, again, what I said before, it's moving people in a way that it hasn't before. And people are more aware of what's happening. They're unable to kind of hide from this, the reality of what's happening. And so that's, I think that's contributing to this outpouring of solidarity. And interesting to note is that today there's a national walkout happening in universities across the United States. And interestingly enough, DeSantis, who is public enemy number one of the people, has actually said that in the state of Florida, he's going to ban all pro-Palestinian groups from university campuses. This is similar to what we've seen in countries across Europe where leaders have said, in response to the hundreds of thousands of people in the streets, you cannot take the streets of the Palestinian flag. You cannot wear a kafia. Your solidarity is banned. It's criminalized. And people are continuing to defy that and say, it doesn't matter. We're going to take the streets. We're going to risk criminalization. We're going to risk losing our jobs, all of these things. Because right now, standing up for humanity and against violence and this senseless, this genocidal violence of Israel against Palestine right now is more important. So I think we're going to continue covering those mobilizations, those protests, these stories, which are so crucial. We have to continue having hope that the international solidarity and the resistance of the Palestinian people will be able to stop this cascading violence towards what could be even worse. So we must continue having this hope and definitely follow us on peoplesdispatch.org. We can find all those stories. You're going to see lots of stories, peoplesdispatch.org. I'm Vijay with Zoe. We're here with you for a live on the attack on Gaza on Palestine. This is our second live. Look forward to the third one. We're not going away soon. Thanks a lot.