Keir Starmer has announced that the UK will recognise the state of Palestine in September, citing conditions that are almost impossible for the current Israeli government to meet. Netanyahu doesn’t want a two-state solution and his response was to lash out at Starmer and the UK in an extraordinary rebuke for a close ally. Many supporters of Israel are criticising Starmer for imposing conditions on Israel but not Hamas. But giving conditions to Hamas in exchange for statehood would recognise Hamas as part of the future of Palestine. Piers Morgan gets the views of Ambassador Majed Bamya, the UN deputy permanent observer to the State of Palestine and Israeli Ambassador Danny Danon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Transcriber: nvidia/parakeet-tdt-0.6b-v2, sat-12l-sm, and large-v3-turbo
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The Two-State Solution Crisis00:14:02
The bombs and the bullets of Israel don't distinguish between a Palestinian Muslim and a Palestinian Christian, between a church and a mosque, between the Christian village of Taipei or the communities in Masafariyata.
Their fight is against the entire Palestinian people.
Telling you that there is no starvation in Gaza.
They are a starvation campaign, a very successful one, by the way.
With this campaign, that is the reason you don't have a ceasefire now.
Because Hamas believe that because now they get the support of the international community, all of a sudden it's only to negotiate with Israel.
The boy was clearly emaciated, Ambassador.
Clearly emaciated.
So yes, he has a medical condition, but also he's clearly not eating.
The United Kingdom will become the 149th country to recognize Palestine as a sovereign state of the United Nations in September.
Prime Minister Sakir Starma recalled his cabinet to discuss the unfolding disaster in Gaza, and he promised this.
I can confirm the UK will recognize the state of Palestine by the United Nations General Assembly in September, unless the Israeli government takes substantive steps to end the appalling situation in Gaza, agree to a ceasefire, and commit to a long-term sustainable peace, reviving the prospect of a two-state solution.
Well, those conditions may prove almost impossible for the current Israeli government to meet, and Keir Starmer knows that.
Netanyahu doesn't want a two-state solution.
Senior members of his government don't even want Palestinians in the West Bank.
His response was to lash Starma and the UK in an extraordinary rebuke for a close ally.
Stalma rewards Hamas's monstrous terrorism, he said, and punishes its victims.
A jihadist state on Israel's border today will threaten Britain tomorrow.
Appeasement towards jihadist terrorists always fails.
It will fail you too.
It will not happen.
Many supporters of Israel are criticizing Stalma for imposing conditions on Israel and not Hamas, but giving conditions to Hamas in exchange for statehood would recognize Hamas as part of the future of Palestine.
That would be a reward.
The real criticism should be for imposing any conditions at all.
The UK should recognize Palestine unconditionally, just as France will, simply because there is no two-state solution without a Palestinian state.
It's also true that there's no two-state solution which includes Hamas, and there is no two-state solution that includes Netanyahu either.
That's why this historic announcement is more about sending a message than anything else.
And the message at least is very clear.
It's time for the killing and suffering to end.
It's time for dignity and peace for the Palestinian people.
And it's time for Israel to listen to its friends.
Well, the UK and France will both recognize Palestine as a sovereign state at the UN General Assembly in September.
And we have two views from the heart of the UN in New York.
Israeli Ambassador Danny Dannon joined shortly.
But first, I'm joined by Ambassador Majid Bamia, the UN Deputy Permanent Observer to the State of Palestine.
Welcome to you, Deputy Permanent Observer.
Can I ask you, first of all, your reaction to this announcement from the British Prime Minister that the UK will, from September, recognize the state of Palestine?
We believe this is long overdue.
We think this is extremely important.
If you believe in the right to self-determination, if you believe we are entitled as all nations to liberty and dignity, and if you believe in peace and the two-state solution, there's no justification not to recognize the state of Palestine.
And we are seeing that many intend to do so in September.
The critics of it say it's a reward to Hamas, a reward for terrorists.
What's your response to that?
Well, let's try this.
Maybe it has something to do with our commitment to the peaceful path to liberation, including in the midst of genocide.
Maybe it has something to do with our rights.
Maybe it has something to do with the wanton destruction of Gaza and the killing of our people and Israel's position, extremist position, against the Palestinian people's existence and against their right to statehood and destroying the two-state solution to which there is no alternative.
And let's be honest, Israel is not proposing to have a one state with all having equal rights from the river to the sea.
That's not their alternative to the Palestinian state.
Their alternative is either to annihilate us, either to forcibly displace us, or either to subjugate us.
So we have the choice.
Do you want genocide, ethnic cleansing, or apartheid?
And so the rightful thing to do is to say, no, the Palestinian people have a right to self-determination and we have to recognize that state as part of preserving these rights and the two-state solution and the chances of peace for the Palestinian people, for the Israeli people and for the entire region.
Do you accept that on October the 7th, that the scale of the terror attack by Hamas means that they in that moment abrogated any right to be part of any government at the end of this war in Gaza and the West Bank for that matter?
I think we are past that conversation.
There is a plan for the day after the end of the war and it foresees an end to the rule of Hamas, Hamas handing over its weapons to the Palestinian Authority that has to resume its governmental functions and unify Gaza and reunify Gaza and the West Bank in the context of an independent and sovereign Palestinian state with also East Jerusalem as its capital.
The fact that the war on the Palestinian people in Gaza is ongoing is delaying these solutions.
The fact that Israel doesn't want a Palestinian authority that is empowered, that it is doing everything to annihilate the forces of peace in Palestine, that it is willing to go on to avoid the prospect of a Palestinian state, is delaying all of this.
How can you give any guarantees that Hamas will accept any of this?
I mean, if you're Hamas right now, you're seeing Israel becoming increasingly unpopular around the world for the scale of what they're doing in Gaza, for the death and suffering that they're causing.
Many people now believe it's gone way past self-defense, that there is a clear plan articulated by the likes of Smodric and Ben-Gavir in the Israeli government to cleanse the Gaza Strip from all Palestinians.
So if you're Hamas, where is the incentive to bring this to an end if you know you're going to give up power?
So first let me tell you, I had friends, diplomats who came to me after the 7th of October and telling me, you understand Israel needs to respond.
You understand what the Israeli people have endured.
They need to restore deterrence.
I haven't seen yet any diplomat that came to me before the 7th of October or now that Israel has killed the 60,000 Palestinians telling me we understand you have to kill Israelis.
We understand that you have to go to violence.
They always call on us to be pacifists, to choose the non-violent way.
And so you cannot demand Palestinian pacifism and justify Israeli militarism.
And there's no right to self-defense and no right to resistance and no right whatsoever, whatever title and beautiful title you put on it, that justify the massacres of a people.
And this was always about getting rid of the Palestinian people.
And it was clear from day one in their statements.
And now I think the whole world recognizes it for what it is.
A plan to get rid of the people and to steal their land.
Now there is an offer by Palestine, the region and the world to have this effort to a two-state solution, but that starts at the heart of it is Palestinian independence, is to stop the war on the Palestinian people in Gaza, but also the assault on the Palestinian people throughout the occupied territory.
We have 1,000 Palestinians killed in the West Bank, including 200 children.
We have 17,000 children killed in Gaza.
All of Gaza has been destroyed.
We have villages being burned as we speak.
We have settlers attacks.
We have occupation forces attacked.
40,000 displaced in the West Bank.
And you know what was our response?
The response of the Arab world, led by Saudi Arabia, who was co-chairing this conference?
There is a must.
We must end the cycle of violence.
We must break it.
And the only way to do that is not by continuing to deny Palestinian rights.
It's by the fulfillment of Palestinian rights.
Not by the destruction of the Palestinian state, but by its independence.
And so you have forces for peace.
And France, who also spoke of recognition first in the context of this conference as a co-chair of it, and now we see a movement, Britain is part of that movement, other countries as well.
They have a vision of peace.
We have a vision of peace.
Israel doesn't.
Israel wants to, even its closest allies, it's listening to no one.
And so the guarantee is all of this.
Is the entire world ready to support the Palestinian Authority resuming its responsibilities with international support, with regional support?
And if Israel accepts that Palestinian state, the two-state solution, fulfilling the rights of the Palestinian people, it has a path to regional integration.
In the midst of a genocide, we're sending a message of peace.
That was the point of the conference.
And Israel wants to portray it as a message of destruction, of anti-Semitism, of negation.
It is not.
It's the Palestinian state living side by side with Israel in peace and security.
And it is the Palestinian state and the Palestinian people who are enduring an existential threat.
Who do you see running Gaza at the end of this war?
It's not going to be Hamas.
Is your vision for this that it would be the Palestinian Authority, which might be very controversial with many Palestinians in Gaza who don't want that?
Could it be another group that comes forward to govern in Gaza?
What do you see happening?
What does it mean?
You have a Palestinian government recognized across the world.
And who tells you that the Palestinian people in Gaza, they want the end of this war?
They are the ones who endure it in their flesh.
You have mothers burying all of their children.
You have people who have been tortured.
You have people being starved by the millions.
You have an entire classroom killed every single day.
10 Palestinian children losing one or two legs every single day.
25 Palestinian children losing one or both parents every single day.
It's been 662 days.
Those who absolutely want this war to end, and they know that part of it is also that reunification and that statehood that will make sure they never have to endure such hell again and that protects them from all of this are the Palestinian people in Gaza.
That is not the concern.
But I am telling you that the only problem Israel has with the Palestinian Authority, and it knows that the Palestinian Authority will have the support of the region and the world, the conclusions of the conference call for an international stabilization mobilization in that context with forces mandated by the Security Council upon the invitation of the Palestinian Authority, but to support our security forces, not instead of them, because that needs to be part of our statehood.
So everybody is willing to contribute to that day after.
But they have to accept that that day after is Palestinian independence.
Israel is always explaining to the world we are one war away from peace.
Netanyahu, you can look at his speeches 10 years ago, 20 years ago, 30 years ago, he's always one war away from peace.
And he thinks that by getting rid of the Palestinian people, that's the solution.
The biggest debuke came from the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Saudi Arabia, who told them the only path to normalization and peace is Palestinian statehood and independence.
And the whole world has rallied around this.
All of these are their enemies now.
The 190 countries who are meeting at the United Nations are the enemies of the people of Israel.
They are the enemies of the government, the policies of the Israeli government of annexation, annihilation, displacement.
Nobody can stand for that.
And honestly, they've been too patient with these practices.
And it is time to hold Israel accountable for its actions.
But just to be clear, because I'm not sure you fully answer my question, do you believe the Palestinian authority would govern after the war in Gaza?
And would that necessitate an election in Gaza?
Or how would you see this happening?
The Palestinian Authority has to resume as soon as possible.
There are some transitional arrangements for six months under the umbrella of the Palestinian Authority and with the role for the Palestinian Authority.
But these arrangements, with the support of the mediators and the role of Egypt and with the Qatar and the Arabs, you know, and the mediation of the United States for a ceasefire, there is a push to have, we have an Arab OIC plan, the entire Arab and Muslim world, to have a return of the Palestinian Authority under the policy of one state, one government, one gun.
So we will be responsible for that.
And there is a commitment by President Abbas in the letter to the co-chairs of the conference, Saudi Arabia and France, to hold elections within a year and a call to help us ensure that we can hold it across the occupied territory, including in East Jerusalem.
But that should not be a reason to delay ending the war, to delay our ability to go.
And this is our duty to help and serve our people after this terrible massacres and attacks by Israel that have destroyed everything.
And Israel never has to pay for it to repair for it.
The whole world has to do it for them.
And even that, they are hampering.
The world sends aid to our people instead of Israel abiding by its own obligation as occupying power.
Starving Children and Lies00:12:01
And it makes sure it never gets to the people or shoots them while they're trying to get it.
They want to portray this as a fight between civilization and barbarism.
I saw the message you showed from Netanyahu.
This is the civilization, starving children, infants dying of hunger.
That's civilization bombing and obliterating everything.
And so they want it to be between Muslims and Jews.
But the bombs and the bullets of Israel don't distinguish between a Palestinian Muslim and a Palestinian Christian, between a church and a mosque, between the Christian village of Taipei or the communities in Masafariata.
Their fight is against the entire Palestinian people.
So it's not a religious conflict.
And we, in the movement in favor of Palestine, you have people from all lines of faith.
And we don't accept that Jews are blamed for what Israel does.
And we don't accept that Israel uses Jews or the Holocaust as a shield from accountability and criticism.
It's an insult to the memory of the victims of the Holocaust, that instead of using the Holocaust as a reason to uphold international law, as a reason to salvage our common humanity, as a reason to end impunity, you use it as a justification for killing children, for atrocities, and for explaining why perpetrators should be shielded from any accountability.
This has to end.
This is destroying Gaza, but it's also destroying the region and the rest of the world.
And that's why the world are coming together to save Gaza, save Palestine.
But also because they want to save Israel from this madness and they want to save the region.
They want to unlock the potential.
They don't want wars anymore.
And the Israeli people, you know, they will have to come out of that incitement against us that these are the new Nazis, that there's a reason to kill children because they will come and kill you eventually from all this narrative that the only way to be safe is to get rid of the Palestinians.
And look around them.
We are, as Palestinians, telling them, we are ready to have peace.
The Arab and the Muslim world are telling them, you have a path to sustainable peace and acceptance in our region.
But it will not be at the expense of the Palestinian people.
It will not be at the expense of their right to freedom.
Is it so hard to accept a Palestinian state and have peace in our region and unlock its potential?
They have to choose between annexation and displacement and killing, and between a Palestinian state and the ability to live with shared peace, shared security, and shared prosperity.
We are trying our best.
It's not easy to say these things while your people are being killed.
It's not easy.
And it may cause misunderstandings in our society in Palestine today.
And there's a lot of anger that can exist.
But I'm telling you, the first ones who understand the importance of moving to peace are the people of Gaza.
And we owe them peace.
We owe them that our children are able to grow without being killed and murdered the way they are.
Our children are not less of children.
When Netanyahu calls our children children of darkness, when he speaks of us as human animals, when is it enough?
You know, the world tolerated Israeli policies for seven decades, from colonization to killing Palestinians to dispossessing us, from the knack battle today.
Gaza, that should be enough.
That should, I mean, 60,000 people, 2 million every day fighting for their lives.
If that doesn't wake up the world, that Israel cannot have a right to life and death over every Palestinian anymore and any longer, that this should have happened long ago.
If we fail at this, if we fail the people of Gaza and the people of Palestine, if we fail the forces of peace in Palestine, Israel, and the region and the world, trust me, we will regret it.
What we do next will determine the future of our region, maybe the future of the rest of the world.
We cannot get it wrong.
And everybody is conscious of that, except this Israeli government who doesn't care.
Ambassador Bamiya, I appreciate you coming on our censor.
Thank you very much.
Thank you very much, Phil.
What you want me now to respond to that is Israel's ambassador to the United Nations, Danny Danon.
Ambassador, thank you very much indeed for coming back on uncensored.
I just had a very passionate plea from Ambassador Bamia on behalf of the Palestinians at the UN to allow Palestinians ultimately to have the same human rights as Israelis and to have statehood that goes with that.
What is intrinsically wrong with that?
Why shouldn't they?
Well, you know, I'm familiar with the shows of Mr. Albamia.
I am seeing him at the UN almost every week.
But let's talk about the facts.
The facts are that, you know, we left Gaza 20 years ago, Pius, completely.
We upputed the settlement, so-called.
We took out the military, even the cemeteries.
And we told the people there, build your future.
You know, the PA was in charge and they had a chance to build a future.
What happened?
Hamas took over and built a terror entity in our backyard.
And we saw what happened on October 7th.
So they shouldn't blame Israel for what happened.
They have to realize that in order for them to have a better future, they have to face the radicals and to fight them and to fight them.
And they are not capable of doing it.
You know, leave Gaza now.
Let's speak about Judea and Samaria, where you have the Palestinian authority in charge today.
They are not capable of fighting terrorists.
You know, in cities like Jenin, Nablus, and even Ramallah, you know, they have a lot of troops, a lot of funding, but they are not capable to stand up and push back against radicals.
When that day will come that they will be able to fight radicals, they can speak about a better future.
Until that day will happen, we will have to be there, neutralize the threat, exactly like what we are doing now in Gaza.
But what many people say, including some of your closest allies in the world, is that you've gone way beyond any proportionate act of self-defense in Gaza, that you are now waging what many people believe is either a genocide or an ethnic cleansing.
You now have openly members of the Israeli government, Smodrich and Ben-Guevir in particular, who are detailing in a gleeful manner their plan to take charge and control of the West Bank, of the Gaza Strip, to remove all Palestinians.
This is ethnic cleansing they're talking about.
It's not even ambiguous.
They're not even trying to hide it.
So what do you say to that, Ambassador?
You raised a lot of issues.
Let me answer all of them.
First, don't look at the words of minister or member of Knesset.
Look at the decision of the Israeli cabinet.
That's how it works in our democracy.
The cabinet decides about the goal of the operation and the military moves forward or backward.
That's regarding their statements.
Second, regarding the claim for genocide, you know, and ethnic cleansing, that's libel.
Those are lies.
It's a campaign of lies.
You know, I face it every day at the UN.
Yesterday you interviewed Mr. Tom Fletcher.
You know, he spread a lie that we killed 14,000 Palestinian babies out of nowhere.
The agency OCHA, that he had, put a number of casualties of Palestinian civilians.
And a day after, they put a different number and reduced it by 10,000 people, not 100, not 1,000, 10,000.
And look what happened with the New York Times, you know, with the horrible campaign they had with this poor Palestinian boy who was sick, and they said he was starving to death.
So there is a campaign of lies against Israel.
But when you speak about proportionality, I have to ask you, what should we do to bring the hostages back?
You know, the reason we started this war, because we were invaded and Israelis were kidnapped from their homes.
We have a commitment to bring them back home.
This war will not end with 50 hostages in Gaza.
Even if the UN will vote about resolutions against Israel and more countries will say that they want to recognize a Palestinian state in the future, it will not change our determination to bring all of them back home to their families.
But this is the whole problem.
Your strategy simply isn't working.
The last hostage came back in February.
Since then, you've launched a three-month blockade of the Gaza Strip, which involved removing any ability to bring in food or aid or water, starving people in a way that is a war crime by most people's understanding of that.
You've now allowed a minimal amount of food to be going in after a huge international outcry.
You say that one child the New York Times put on the front page wasn't starving.
He clearly was starving.
He just had other medical issues going on as well.
And there are, we know from all the imagery, well you can shake your head, but there are, as you know, many, many, many images.
Let's speak about the little...
Hang on, let me finish.
Let me finish.
Let me finish.
I'll let you finish.
That there are many, many images coming out of Gaza of starving children.
We're not making this up.
And if you really believe it's not happening and all of this is a blood libel, then again, I've had this conversation with you before, you should be pressurizing your prime minister to allow international media to go into Gaza to verify exactly what is happening.
But you know, I want to play you a clip.
This is from the B.
Oh, hang on.
I want to play you a clip.
You're spreading so many lies.
Hang on one second.
Ambassador, with respect.
I will let you respond.
I will let you respond.
I will let you respond, but let me just play one clip to you of the BBC's Middle East editor, Jeremy Bowen, who's reported from every war zone in the last 25, 30 years.
Here's what he reported for the BBC.
So the Jordanians have passed on a message from the Israelis.
The Israelis don't want us to film out of the window at the devastation inside Gaza.
But I've spent 10 minutes looking at it with my own eyes.
And I can tell you that communities in the north of Gaza that I knew well, very vibrant, tens of thousands of people living hard lives, but actually with a remarkable human spirit, are flat.
There's nothing left of them.
Now that's the truth, isn't it, Ambassador?
You don't want journalists to go in there because what they're going to uncover and report to the world is utterly horrifying.
You have destroyed two-thirds, if not more now, of the Gaza Strip.
You've displaced 2 million people into a very small area of the strip.
And you now have ministers who you say we shouldn't take seriously, but whose views are never publicly corrected or condemned by Prime Minister Netanyahu.
So Smodrich and Ben Gavir talk openly now about a plan to remove all Palestinians from the Gaza Strip and from the West Bank.
And you simply say as the ambassador, well, you shouldn't take them seriously.
Why shouldn't we?
Why shouldn't we?
I've not heard Netanyahu.
Netanyahu doesn't say what they're saying is wrong.
Keep going.
You know, if that's an interview, keep going.
For six minutes now, you can respond.
You're saying movies.
I'm going to say now you respond.
If I would have to respond, you know, each allegation, it would take us 15 minutes now.
So when you say a lie, tell me the lie.
You spoke about the New York Times picture.
Let's speak about that for a minute.
That was blood libel.
When you put a picture of a sick Palestinian boy who has a disease and you claim that he was starving, that was a lie.
And by the way, they retracted that.
But the way they retracted it was also shameful.
They put it in a small page on their Twitter with other children were starving.
I said other children.
No, you said that this boy was also starving.
You want to rewind it too many times?
The boy is clearly.
He was also starving.
The boy was clearly emaciated, Ambassador.
Forced Displacement as Ethnic Cleansing00:09:48
Clearly emaciated.
So yes, he has a medical condition, but also he's clearly not eating, right?
No, that's...
Why deny what we see with our own eyes?
So look at his brother when you can see the picture that his brother is well fed and he has no issues with the family.
But this boy, because this boy is not eating.
Is your position, to be clear, that no...
Are you saying no children are starving in Gaza?
Is that your position?
I'm telling you that there is no starvation in Gaza.
There's a starvation campaign, a very successful one, by the way.
And this campaign is actually...
Well, Donald Trump believes there's a starvation.
Wait, let me finish with all due respect.
With this campaign, that is the reason you don't have a ceasefire now.
Because Hamas believe that because now they get the support of the international community, all of a sudden they don't need to negotiate with Israel because aid is coming in.
They can take over the aid again.
And we can speak about what's happened with the UN not picking up the aid because of Hamas.
They will not tell you that, but you have aid inside Gaza that the UN is not capable of distributing it.
But it's easier to blame Israel.
So for Hamas now, they make a mistake.
They think they shouldn't negotiate with us.
But I tell you that, we will not stop this war with the hostages in Gaza, regardless of what you're going to say, regardless of the blood libel we saw at the New York Times and other media outlets.
We know it's the campaign.
But this campaign will not change our determination to bring them home.
We will not leave them in the tunnels, regardless of all those lies and all those declarations.
Yay, Mike Baker here, host of the President's Daily Brief podcast.
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Do you accept that if there is an attempt to move the Palestinian population out of Gaza completely, that that would represent ethnic cleansing and a war crime?
Do you accept that in principle?
Absolutely not.
You know, I think President Trump put it forward and he said that it should require consent.
If somebody in Gaza wants to move now to a different place, he should be allowed to do it.
Nobody should force him.
But if he wants to move.
What if they don't want to?
What if it's involuntary?
If you want to move now from London to New York or from New York to London, you can do that.
You can apply for a student visa.
I'm asking you about voluntary.
No, I'm not sure.
What if it's involuntary?
No, absolutely not.
I'm talking about consent from both sides.
Consent from the President.
But if there's no consent, do you accept?
Do you accept if there is no consent from the Palestinian people?
If no one is displaced out of Gaza, let me finish my question.
Let me finish my question.
Ambassador, let me ask you a precise question so the viewers can understand.
If it is done without their consent, in other words, they are forcefully displaced out of Gaza, out of the West Bank, would you accept that is ethnic cleansing and a war crime if that is what happens?
No one is speaking about that.
That is something which is not acceptable.
They are.
Smodrich and Ben Gevir are literally talking about that.
No one is speaking.
The two senior members of your government.
No one is speaking about that.
They are literally speaking about it, Ambassador, with respect.
They are literally, that is what they're speaking about.
I'm a representative of the Israeli government, and I'm telling you, and you can look at the protocol of all the debates in the government and the cabinet.
It was never discussed.
It's not on the table.
And also, President Trump's vision was about offering a possibility for people to relocate.
It happened in Ukraine.
It happened in different areas in the world when people wanted to move to a different place.
If they want to do it, and by the way, they can come back afterward if they want to.
But why only the people in Gaza are not being allowed to even think about a future in a different place?
Why if they want to live in one of the Arab countries or if they want to come to the US or to Europe, why not even giving them the option to discuss it?
Why do you say, no, you have to stay there for eternity when all other citizens of the world are allowed to think about a future in a different place?
Okay, well, why don't Israelis move out of Israel then and let the Gazans go and live there?
Well, Israel, if they want to move, they can move.
And the people of Gaza, if they want to find a different future, they should be allowed to do that.
But I think you touched a point.
I think some people in Gaza, the radicals, they don't want a better future.
They don't care about the future of their children.
They care about eliminating Israel.
And that is the core of the problem.
It's not about where they live and how they live.
It's about the fact that some elements in Gaza, the Radicals one, don't want to see the existence of Israel.
Period.
Read the Constitution of Hamas.
Read what the muakama, the resistance for the jihadic means.
That's the essence of their existence.
And even today, when there are negotiations offering them to go to exile, you know, to live a very good life in different countries in the Middle East, you know what they say?
We don't want to live in a different place.
We want to stay in Gaza and to fight the jihad against Israel.
That is the main problem.
You know, if you look to what's happened in the last 20 years, how many billions of dollars were invested in Gaza by the UN, by the US, by the EU?
And that money wasn't used to build a better society, a better future.
It was used to build hate and weapons of mass destruction against Israel.
You know, the biggest problem, it seems to me, Thomas Friedman, the New York Times columnist, wrote a great column today in which he said the reality of what is happening now in this war is that you have the worst Palestinian leadership ever with Hamas, and you have the worst, most far-right wing Israeli government ever as well.
In other words, you have the worst of the worst leading both sides in this war, both of whom now appear increasingly wedded to the destruction of the other.
And the victims in all this are the Israeli citizens and the Palestinian citizens who are not members of Hamas or the Israelis who are not signed up to this worldview expressed by Gavir and Smodrich of getting rid of all Palestinians.
That is not what most Israelis actually want, I don't believe.
Maybe they do, but I don't believe they want a form of ethnic cleansing.
What they want is to try and get a solution of peace, but there is no will for peace.
There's no will on the Israeli government side to bring this to an end.
Because the moment it ends, Netanyahu gets held accountable for what happened October the 7th, and he has to be back in a criminal court facing corruption charges.
He has no incentive to end it.
Hamas have no incentive to end it either.
They just want to keep killing as many Jews as they can possibly kill.
I don't make any pretense that that's what they want to do.
But you have the worst of the worst leaders on both sides now in an implacable war which shows no sign of ending and neither side wants it to end.
And that is the absolute tragedy about what is happening now in Gaza.
Pierce, it's a shameful comparison.
You know, how dare Thomas Friedman equate the prime minister of Israel was elected by the people of Israel to the Hamas regime.
You know, we have a democracy.
We have elections.
Prime Minister Netanyahu was elected.
Hamas took over control over Gaza and there was no elections there and they actually shoot the opposition there.
So to make that comparison, it's shameful.
It's shameful.
And you know that Prime Minister Netanyahu, and you can say a lot of things about him, but he always tried to delay conflicts and to avoid wars.
But this war was brought upon us.
And he had no choice to defend Israel and to fight to bring the hostages back.
That is his responsibility.
He was elected to protect the people of Israel.
If somebody comes and kidnap innocent Israelis, we expect the leader of the country to bring them back.
That is duty.
And that's what he's doing now, representing the people of Israel.
So I think any comparison between Netanyahu and Hamas is not acceptable.
Well, let's remind people that Benjamin Netanyahu, who actively supported funding Hamas to the tune of billions of dollars, he wanted to create a divide and rule with the Palestinian authority.
He thought that would make Israel more secure.
In fact, it had the opposite effect.
It's made Israel far less secure, as has this relentless bombardment and destruction of Gaza, the killing of more than 60,000 Palestinians, 20,000 plus children.
None of this has made Israel safer.
It's made it more dangerous to be an Israeli.
It's made it more dangerous to be a Jew living around the world.
And as somebody who has always supported Israel and has many Israeli and Jewish friends, I speak as a friend when I say, end this madness.
This is completely insane.
The rest of the world is now looking at Israel utterly aghast.
Even your closest allies, even your friends, even your supporters.
Ending the Madness in Israel00:02:20
And they're saying, when is enough enough?
This has to stop.
And I just don't understand why, and I've interviewed you many times.
I've always found you a very respectful person to interview.
And I appreciate you coming back on.
But I cannot believe that you don't wake up in the morning now and see the clarity of how incredibly unpopular this war strategy is now making Israel.
And that also it's not achieving its aims.
You're not getting the hostages released.
You're not beating Hamas because they're still operating and holding you to ransom of the hostages.
None of this is working.
All you're doing is apparently doing exactly what Smodric and Ben Gavir have articulated is the real plan, which is getting the Palestinians out of Adagaza.
And if you do that, then Israel will be hated for the rest of my life.
And that's just a reality.
And I don't get it.
I don't know why the sensible Israelis are not speaking up and saying, enough of this.
We're not being held ransom by this hard right government anymore doing this crap in our names.
On October 7th, Piers, I was in Israel.
I was a member of the coalition of the government of Netanyahu.
And I can tell you that if we wanted to evacuate the people of Gaza, we would have done it by now.
Believe me, we had the capabilities.
It wasn't the decision of the government.
And you looked at the way we operated in Gaza when 900 Israeli soldiers died during the operation.
It's because we have to maneuver in a very careful manner in order to minimize civilian casualties.
That's why this war is so difficult for us and it's so long.
It's the longest war in our history.
And the price is a heavy price.
But I have to tell you one thing.
Today, there's a different situation.
You know, despite everything you said, that, you know, we are being condemned.
But I think the threat of Hamas today is not the same threat we had on October 7th.
The threat of Hezbollah is not the same, and the threat of Iran is not the same.
So yes, we change things, but we have to finish the job.
And finishing the job is the day when the hostages will be back on.
We have to realize that.
You know, how can you explain to the families of those people after two years that we concluded the military operation and we left the hostages behind?
Why This War Is So Long00:00:41
I cannot explain that.
No one can explain that.
Ambassador Donald, like I say, I appreciate you coming back on Uncensored.
You come on regularly.
I do appreciate that and hearing your perspective.
Thank you very much.
Thank you very much.
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