 Well, you're back with Zoe Alexandra from People's Dispatch. I'm Vijay Prashad. We are doing our fourth live on the Israeli war on Gaza. Today is the 31st of October. This war has been going on now for three weeks. You know, Zoe, it's always hard to talk about this as a war because it's so asymmetrical. And yet, of course, we don't have vocabulary to talk about it in any other way. People are saying genocide, people are saying other things. It's not entirely a one-way street because the Palestinian factions have been resisting. I'm going to come back to that in a second. UNICEF released a very important statement, said that Gaza is becoming a living hell. That's UNICEF's language, saying that Gaza is becoming a graveyard for thousands of children. Very hard to keep up with the numbers that are coming of the dead. The Ministry of Health says 8,525 Palestinians killed. That's a lot of people killed in three weeks of them. And this is the part where UNICEF sprays a graveyard for thousands of children. It makes sense 3,542 children dead. What hasn't been talked about is that they're over 21,000 injured. There are 2,000 people missing, of them 1,100 children. A lot of children impacted because Gaza is a very young place. If you traveled to Gaza, you would have seen in Khan Yunus, in Beit Jalon, in Gaza City, in Rafa City. Lots of kids everywhere. And it's kids who are bearing the brunt of this. Just hours ago in Jabalia refugee camp and Al-Shayt refugee camp, both of them in Gaza's north. Vicious airstrikes, tank fire and so on. Between 100 and 400 people killed. Indonesian hospital reports 50 dead bodies brought in from Jabalia. Now, the Israelis are saying, we told you to leave. Of course, the access roads to the south had been bombed. Very difficult for people to up and leave. They worry, they are scared. Many of them have taken refuge in the anti rooms of hospitals and so on. They simply don't know where they can go. So the strike on Jabalia, vicious strike up to 400 dead so far. We don't know what the breakdown is likely. And here, Zoe, if the ratios stand, likely 200 of them children, likely, perhaps more, hard to say. Israeli tanks now have entered the north of Gaza Strip. They are in the Karama area, north of Gaza City. Tanks have also come in the central region. They have been seen at Saladin Street, which is the access, the road that divides north and south Gaza. What it looks like is that the Israeli tanks have entered the north and the south to encircle the northern part of Gaza. Netanyahu himself said in the last 24 hours, Israel has struck what he called 300 targets. Several of them residential homes in Jabalia camp. Pretty ghastly situation. UN agencies report that Gaza is now at 5% of water. If you think the only way children are going to die in Gaza from the bombing, from the aerial bombardment and tanks, you have another thing coming. They're going to start dying of dehydration, of malnutrition and so on. UN agencies report some of their storehouses for food have been ransacked by hungry people. Look, I've traveled in Gaza. I know that this is not a place of danger. You can walk around anywhere. This is not a place where you fear theft. There's an extraordinary low theft rate. On the other hand, desperate people breaking into UN storehouses to eat a graveyard for thousands of children living hell. You're in Washington DC now in anticipation of the November 4th protest. We're going to talk about that later, Zoe. But of course, the United States government providing a kind of defensive shield, an iron dome of its own around the Israeli government, not allowing a ceasefire, even talk of a ceasefire. It's not only the US, we should say, in Britain, for instance, another major power, both Rishi Sunak, the Prime Minister and Kier Stammer, leader of the Labour Party, against the idea of a ceasefire. Something so important as a ceasefire off the table for these people. What's happening in Washington? Why is everybody seemingly against a ceasefire in the US political class? Well, we spoke about this on the last show. There's this insane kind of cognitive dissidents where you have a complete refusal of politicians in Washington to actually make a call for a ceasefire. There's a group of about 18 members of Congress led by Cory Bush, who is a representative from the St. Louis area, calling for a ceasefire resolution. Again, this has received almost no support in the House of Representatives. And in the Senate, even members of the Senate who have had maybe more respectable positions, maybe more left positions in the past, spoken out about the bombings in prior moments, have essentially refused. Bernie Sanders, the farthest that he's gone, and let's remember, it took over 3,000 children to be killed for him to even get to this language, has called for humanitarian truce. Again, this is not a ceasefire. This is having a pause so that humanitarian aid, which is currently blocked, can be let in. So that on one hand, and it's this resolution, which is led by, again, Cory Bush, Rashida Tlaib, Andre Carson, Dele Ramirez. It's interesting because Cory Bush actually comes out of the protest movement in Ferguson, Missouri. And if people remember that this was a huge uprising following the murder of Mike Brown by Ferguson police. And it was a moment where activists in the United States were rising up and were facing a lot of police repression. And I think a lot of people remember that there was this kind of beautiful solidarity where Palestinian activists were seeing this repression of black activists, of BLM activists on the streets in Ferguson and giving them tips on how to deal with tear gas. And so it's no surprise, I think, that someone like Cory Bush in this moment would really push for this. And what's sad is that more progressive legislators are not joining her. And that they continue, I mean, a really, really atrocious clip of Hillary Clinton saying that, how could we call for a ceasefire? If a ceasefire means capitulating to Hamas and it means essentially kneeling to Hamas. And this is just ridiculous, completely unfounded. And we see that the call for the ceasefire has majority support. Not only of people across the globe in Africa and in West Asia, but also people in the United States. Again, as we spoke about last episode on Saturday, hundreds of Jews were occupying the Grand Central train station calling for a ceasefire. People have been on the streets every day saying this is an essential demand. We cannot let this genocidal violence against people in Gaza continue. Yet US politicians say that this is a complete out of the question. And it's also such a historical reading of what's happening. They're saying that there can be no ceasefire until the hostages are released. And it's a complete, of course, intentional misreading of the situation because from the start, Hamas has said we will release the hostages when the 10,000 now Palestinian prisoners are released. And even the families of the hostages have demanded that the Israeli government actually have some sense and actually think about the well-being and the lives of their family members who are being held hostage. And they say, this is the only sensible solution. We're not talking about a situation. Again, as the Secretary General of the United Nations says, we're not talking about a situation in a vacuum. We're talking about a conflict that has very, very clear roots and that there's very clear demands on the table and this position of the US and Israel to just completely ignore that and say we have to continue an essential annihilation of a population is truly criminal. And I think what you're saying is exactly right, that the support that the US has provided to Israel, not only in the billions of dollars of military aid, but also this shield against any sort of united political action, whether it be in the UN Security Council or whether it be by its own Congress actually taking action. And I think it's really interesting because it's common to say that standing against Israel is political suicide. And I think that US politicians have to think really deeply about what does it mean about their constituents going out every day facing rain, facing arrest, demanding a ceasefire, and they're turning their backs on them. So I think that who is the political suicide for their donors or their constituents? It's a very important question of political leadership. To go back to the Palestinian scenario around Palestine, other political leaders are struggling with what to do. In the United States, the political leadership has decided no ceasefire. We're going to allow Israel, as James Kirby said, no red lines. They can do anything they want. They want to kill 400-plus people in Jabalia. Go ahead, kill 400 people in Jabalia. You want to bomb, you know, go back and bomb Khan Yunus. Go back and bomb Khan Yunus. 2014, the Israelis entered Gaza in force. You know, there was, I think, 2,000-3,000 people killed at the time. By the way, 65 Israeli soldiers killed. Already Hamas has said and other Palestinian factions have said they've taken out a couple of tanks. They are fighting them here and there. It's not easy to actually battle when you've got bombing happening from overhead, but apparently they are fighting in certain places in the north against the advance of Israeli tanks. But in the regional scenario, what can one expect? The government of Iran. Now, the United States has been saying Iranian proxies are doing this, Iranian proxies. The government of Iran has said we don't want a war. 72 US battleships are sitting in the eastern Mediterranean directly threatening Iran. Iran has said we directly don't want to enter this conflict. Interesting statement. The foreign minister of Lebanon has said we don't want to enter this conflict. He said that even Hezbollah doesn't want to enter the conflict. He doesn't want to get back to Hezbollah in a second. But you've got Lebanon, you've got Iran, you've got other leaders saying we don't want this to extend. We want a ceasefire. On the other hand, so far silence from Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah of Hezbollah hasn't spoken. I've said this before, when Nasrallah speaks, Nasrallah is going to declare war. Therefore, he's holding his horses. I must say, it's getting hard for the Hezbollah fighters, all 100,000 of them. Very hard for them to sit and watch what's happening in Gaza. It's very difficult for the factions in Syria to sit back and watch what's happening. And certainly it's been difficult for the rebels in Yemen, the so-called Houthi rebels, Al-Ansar, Al-Din rebels. Very hard for them to sit back. All of these places you've seen rocket fire towards Israel from Yemen, from Syria, from Lebanon. Israel has a very sophisticated missile defense system, the Iron Dome, yes, but also the Arrow system. And both the Iron Dome and Arrow have been able to defend against the rocket attacks from Yemen, from Lebanon and so on. In Lebanon, Amnesty International reports that Israel has used white phosphorus in the border regions against Hezbollah targets. Now, what's happening? There is no declaration from Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah. No declaration has come from the militia groups in Syria. No declaration has come from Ansar Al-Din in Yemen. These are fighters in the ranks who just cannot be held back, who are so angry and frustrated. They are firing their rockets. I think my opinion, without any chain of command telling them to do so. And so Israel is right now retaliating against a non-war. There is no war declared from these regional entities. But as the killings increase, I don't know if Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah can control his people. He is going to be under pressure to push the green light and let them let go the 100,000 fighters firing sophisticated rockets. Much more sophisticated, Hezbollah says, than they had in 2006 at Tel Aviv, at other places in the north of Israel. It's going to be impossible for the factions in Syria to hold fast if Hezbollah goes. They will go too. The Syrians will then advance towards the Golan Heights. If the Syrians move, the Yemenis are going to certainly put a lot of pressure on their allies inside Jordan and so on. I mean, the danger of spillover right now is very high. And what is provoking the spillover? It's not recklessness from Tehran. Tehran is saying, we don't want this. It's not even recklessness from Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah. He's not spoiling for a fight with Israel. They are prepared for it, but he's not spoiling for it. This is being provoked by the Israeli actions inside Gaza. That is the principle provocation. I mean, the fact that Israel has decided to strike places in South Lebanon using white phosphorus. It's almost as if the Israelis are provoking Hezbollah to come at them because they feel that with 72 U.S. warships sitting off the coast of the Levant, United States will pummel South Lebanon, pummel Beirut. I'm not sure if this is exactly in the calculations of Hezbollah, but I can see why they are holding fast. Meanwhile, of course, the West Bank, it's its own fire, Zoe. What's happening in the West Bank? Well, yes, it's definitely important to remember that violence has also been escalating against Palestinians in the West Bank. Over 100 people have been killed since October 7th. And as we reminded in our last live stream, this year was already the most deadly for Palestinians in the West Bank. It's Jerusalem and Gaza in terms of the number of people that have been killed by Israeli forces. And what's interesting to point out is that actually the violence that people are seeing across the West Bank is not only from occupation forces, but also from settlers. And there's been a huge spike in attacks. Over 2000 have been injured. And additionally, as we mentioned before, the sort of selective arrest campaigns have been really on the rise. Again, over 1100 people have been detained in the West Bank since October 7th. And within the prisons themselves, there have been reports of extremely atrocious conditions. Two prisoners have actually been killed or died, as we said, as we talked about last week with the past tense. In these conditions, there have been reports of them being deprived of food, being deprived of water, of blankets, of basic conditions in these prisons. And it's interesting, it's always important to bring it back to the prisons because this is the key demand. As we said, people are being unjustly held under their thousands being held under the administrative detention ordinance, which essentially means Israel can keep you in prison almost and definitely keep renewing the administrative detention order, which means you're not formally charged with anything. You have no way to a trial. Many of your basic rights are violated. This is really crucial. And there's also been an increase in the Israeli forces raids in terms of its intensity. So we've seen over the past year, these raids where they come in with the troops, take people out of their houses at night. However, we've seen this past week, tanks rolling in to the Janine refugee camp. We saw tanks destroying an entire neighborhood in the Janine refugee camp. We've seen airstrikes. So this is a serious escalation. Again, I mean, it's hard to even list out how many levels and layers of international law are being violated in this situation. We know that there have been calls for Israel to be brought before the ICC. We also know that these are constantly blocked by the US, but we have seen Spanish politicians. We've seen the House in Sierra Ramaphosa calling for this. But we have to keep our eyes on the West Bank because this is there with the settler attacks under the protection of these Israeli forces. This is seriously worrying. People are continuing to go out on the streets in Ramallah. There have been numerous national strikes that have been taking place even in Janine where the attacks have been extremely fierce on an almost nightly basis. People are still protesting, standing with their brothers and sisters in Gaza, standing with the other part of Palestine which they long to be reunited with. They long to be united with, meanwhile, of course, aid not getting into Palestine at all. Very interesting, important for people to know. Through the Rafa crossing, which bridges the border between Egypt and Palestine, that's the only crossing where trucks are allowed to go across. 150 trucks have gone across. It used to be 500 trucks a day to basically supply the Ghazan province of Palestine, 500 trucks a day. That's power over the past three weeks, only 150 trucks. And by the way, it's not easy. First, the Israelis are insisting, all trucks have to go to Nitzana. Nitzana is an Israeli crossing which is closed. So they get to Nitzana, 50 kilometers south of the Rafa crossing. They are unloaded at Nitzana. The Israelis check everything in the truck. Then they repackage the truck and send it 50 kilometers north to Rafa. At Rafa, those trucks are not allowed to enter. They have to be unloaded. They have to be loaded on to Palestinian trucks, and then they are allowed to go into Rafa city. So imagine, when people say, well, trucks are entering, the details are important here. The Israelis are basically constructing a humanitarian mirage, you know, allowing people to think, well, trucks are coming in. But in fact, they are blocking trucks, still blocking electricity. And as I said earlier, only 5% of Gaza's water needs are being fulfilled. And a lot of that is through tanks and so on, not through the delivery of fresh water. In fact, it's in a medieval siege of a higher kind. But this bizarre Nitzana to Rafa thing that they are doing is extraordinary. And it bears a notice by the international population. Now the Europeans, 27 of them have called for a humanitarian pause. I don't even know what a humanitarian pause is. I don't know why they can't get the word ceasefire out of their mouths, you know, ceasefire. It's a much swifter word than humanitarian pause. Don't get it. But they are thinking, ah, let's send a boat with humanitarian aid to Gaza. Just a minute, Macron, just a minute, Rishi Sunak and the rest of you. A boat, where are you going to land the boat? The only port in Gaza that's semi functional is in Gaza City. That's the only port and Gaza City is the epicenter of the Israeli attack. So you're going to get the Israelis to stop that attack while you send a ship with humanitarian aid. Good God, I mean the level of naivete or duplicity coming out of European capitals. I mean actually betting on duplicity. In other words, they know very well that it's highly unlikely that the Israeli government is going to stop the bombardment of Gaza City to permit a ship to enter. They know it's not going to happen because they know it's not going to happen. It's quite easy for them to say we would like this to happen because it's not going to happen. So they sound like they are being concerned about the situation in what the United Nations Children's Agency called a living hell. Also called a graveyard for thousands of children. You know, that's what UNICEF, that's their phrase. Well, it's okay now the Europeans say we want to prevent this living hell, make it something less than that. I don't think so. If you were serious, you would insist on a ceasefire, which they are not insisting upon and you would insist on having the checking if there needs to be Israeli checking. Although I don't see why there needs to be Israeli checking at the Rafa crossing. If they need to be checking, have it at Rafa. Why are you getting the trucks to drive to Nitzana, you know, unload, reload, get back to Rafa, unload, reload and then carry on. All of it is designed in a way to prevent aid from entering. All talk of humanitarian aid is a mirage right now. It's not serious. The world is angry, Zoe, on November 4th looks like millions of people, tens of millions of people will be on streets around the world. Tell us a little bit about that. Yes, I think it's going to be an extremely historic day. There are mobilizations planned in dozens of cities and dozens of capitals from across the world. We saw last weekend there were half a million people in the streets of London. In, as we just said in the beginning, I'm in Washington DC right now where there's expected to be the largest march for Palestine in US history here. I mean, there's dozens and dozens of buses coming from cities from across the country, even people coming from Puerto Rico to join. So this is in DC, this is going to be a truly historic day. People have been mobilizing, again, in North Africa and West Asia. I spoke to the youth coordinator of the Youth Front against normalization to understand really what's driving, again, these protests. This shared understanding that Zionism is the hands of imperialism in the region. They're going to be on the streets. We've seen massive, massive demonstrations in Rabat, in Tunis, in Cairo even defying the kind of de facto ban on people taking to the streets. It's really incredible to see this outpouring. And again, I think it can't be understated the historic moment that we're in right now. Despite the fact, as you've said, politicians seem reluctant to even utter the word ceasefire. It seems like it's too clunky for them to say or too difficult. The people of the world are saying it and they're saying it every single day on the streets, in conversations, on social media. This is definitely the moment. And so there will be this big day of action. The International People's Assembly is calling for this, many, many other networks of people's movements, of trade unions. We also saw today, for example, trade unions in Belgium refusing to move arm shipments. I think that the tide is rising across sectors of society. And it's going to become, if it isn't already, a political blunder for politicians to not listen. And I think that there is this realization that not standing with the millions will cost. Right now, maybe they will continue to get the political benefits and privileges, economic privileges they get from not speaking out. But I think sooner rather than later that people of the world are going to see that these people who are not listening to them are not really representing them at all. To come back on that point as we wind up, so far, death toll from Gaza, 8,525, 2,000 missing of them, 1,100 children. Fresh reports coming out of Jabalia refugee camp where apartment buildings have been struck. One person I spoke with said 50 members of a friend's family were wiped out in that attack on Jabalia. Jabalia is a very densely populated place. It's not easy to tell people in a place like that to just leave and go somewhere else. It's likely everybody knew that there would be large numbers of people who just couldn't go anywhere. They didn't go anywhere. They were struck and entire families wiped out. Lineages are being disappeared in this war in Gaza. Names of Palestinian families are being obliterated. No way to remember them, but in memory. Let's see if the world community on November 4th Zoe is able to put pressure at least to call for if nothing else a ceasefire. See you later. Thanks a lot.