there are some experts uh in the room uh
Kate Hudson from the leader of of CND
for example and I apologize to people
like her uh if in the course of what I
have to say I kind of state what to some
people is the obvious uh but it's my
experience that what one thinks is
obvious isn't always at least not to
everyone and uh there are some mistakes
uh that are being made on Twitter and
Facebook and in discourse that I'm
seeing around the place that I want to
insist that we must
correct uh and I'm going to start with
the most obvious uh of
those
our battle here our conflict our
struggle here is not not not against
Jews there are far too many people whose
intentions hither to may not have been
in any
way
ill but they're putting up foolish
pictures of Hitler or of uh of Netanyahu
dressed in a Hitler uniform or worse
than that even seeing things like well
now we know why Hitler uh did what he
did this is completely unacceptable and
some of you may know I have been
remorselessly blocking on Twitter anyone
who even vaguely uh touches the space
across the line which is acceptable this
is really really important for two
reasons first of all hitlerism fascism
is the worst most poisonous most
murderous most genocidal ideology that
ever existed and Muslims and others
should know that once they were finished
with the Jews it wouldn't have been long
before they turned to Muslims they
murdered Slavs they murdered anyone that
they regarded as un men sub human and
the Jews were the easiest and most uh
tempting targ
because of the sheer number of those in
Germany when Hitler came to power it is
a grotesque thing
to call in any way in
Aid the ideas of hitlerism or fascism
when dealing with the monstrosity of
Netanyahu and the actions of the Israeli
State that's number one number two it's
often a trap
the hasbara the public diplomacy as it's
euphemistically called professional and
voluntary though we now know in the last
few weeks students have been paid a
stipend to join in this public diplomacy
on social media and so on it is one of
their principal tactics to lure their
critics into a position where they can
be described as anti
semites and so some I don't know how
many some of these provocations are
being actually mounted by people whose
principal purpose is to defend the
crimes of Israel and if possible to get
you to identify uh with the hateful
anti-semitic uh imagery and words that
they put out in my case I have to be
extremely Vigilant I have now more than
half a million people following me on
social media all it needs is one person
to put up such a post and I don't see it
or my comrades don't see it perhaps for
a few days maybe not at all in the sheer
scale of the traffic and before you know
it you have a story that somebody posted
a picture of Hitler on my site and I
left it there somehow uh endorsing it by
having left it there so please be on
your guard about any such talk any such
provocations not just because they are
wrong and they could not be more wrong
but because they may even be a trap
designed to strengthen not weaken
Netanyahu and the Zionist gang who are
carrying out these
atrocities I put it this way this is not
the
Holocaust 1,000 people is horrific but
it is not the Holocaust the Holocaust
involved Millions upon millions of
people perhaps 10 millions or more well
over half of them Jews systematically
industrially building factories in order
to annihilate people and with a clear
and defined General genocidal purpose
this is not the
Holocaust and Israel are not the
Nazis but they are behaving like Nazis
in this
current
conflict the dark
heart of Zionism and its ideology and
practice has been
exposed and I said during castled and
I'm saying it again
now and the furor about it during cast
lead was great the furor about it now is
not because it's kind of
obvious this may not be and is not the
Holocaust but it is the Warsaw Ghetto in
fact it's the Warsaw Ghetto in almost
every
particular the Nazis built a ghetto in
Warsaw
surrounded it by bar wire and guards
with
dogs and allowed the people inside to
waste away and
starve and to
will the contraction of fatal disease
which began one by one to wipe out the
Jews entrapped in the Warsaw
Ghetto
deciding that they would rather die on
their feet
then die one by one on their knees or
their bed or wait for their captor to
come along and put them on a train to a
gas chamber and kill them the Jews in
the Warsaw Ghetto rose up and wrote
their name in the
stars the Nazis called them terrorists
they actually used that W everybody else
regarded them as Heroes as Freedom
Fighters
I maintain that the situation in Gaza is
exactly comparable to the situation of
the Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto I believe
that that is a fair
comparison the situation in Gaza has
gotten far worse since I was last there
as you may know during castled some of
you may even have been with me I led
first one and then several Siege
breaking convoys which entered Gaza and
broke the siege bringing material aid
but more importantly raising the banner
of Palestine all the way through the
countries that we traveled and lifting
the spirits of the people entrapped in
Gaza and the situation that we found
there could hardly be worse we thought
except it now is
worse when we got there we discovered
Something Like 880,000 Houses schools
hospitals clinics public buildings of
all kinds including the uh presidents
residents including the uh airport
expensively uh built by the European
Union's
taxpayers uh schools and hospitals
expensively maintained by the world
taxpayer through the United
Nations hospitals and other facil
facilities provided by the taxpayers of
many countries and the uh charity givers
of many countries had all been
systematically destroyed thousands and
thousands of people had been killed or
maimed something like 65,000 people were
homeless the wreckage the ruin the smell
of death was everywhere and it was a
sounding to us that when we entered Gaza
with our first
Convoy in the middle of the night thanks
to the then Mubarak
dictatorship the entire Journey from the
border at Rafa Into the Heart of Gaza
City we were lined by at least half of
the population of Gaza who had waited up
all night to welcome the foreigners who
had come quite an arduous Journey facing
many difficulties most of them at the
hands of Arab regimes to which I shall
return they were grateful we were
humbled humbled by the scale of the
problems the pitiful Quantum of what we
had been able to bring and humbled by
the absolute determination sincerity
piety and Fidelity of the people in the
Gaza Enclave the Gaza open air prison as
David camon once but only once briefly
described it the situation now is being
heaped upon a population that from the
last day I was there uh which is in uh
uh
2009 so 5 years ago now is in every
respect worse 80% of the people in Gaza
are unemployed 80% of the people in Gaza
are living on less than a dollar and a
half a day 80% of the children of Gaza
are either malnourished officially
according to the measurements of the
United Nations or
undernourished every kind of problem is
now and has been over the last 5 years
since I was last there
multiplying and the
second Point therefore I wish to come to
is to help people deal with they may
already know it but if you don't here's
the facts when you are
told that the resistance in
Gaza is hiding behind the civilian
population is using the civilian
population as human Shields when you're
told why are are asked why are the
weapons so close to the people in
Gaza Gaza is 25 mil long and 4.5 mil
wide it is one of the most densely
populated places on the earth there is
no open space in Gaza there are no
mountains there is no jungle there is no
place where there resist res istance
could
go even if it were wise for them to do
so the resistance are the
people it's not an army the Palestinians
don't have an
army they have
fighters who are living in this hell
hole and bearing arms for the day which
comes often enough when their hell hole
is invaded their family is
massacred that little that they have is
destroyed all around
them they say why are the
Rockets amongst the
population the question is not why there
are Rockets amongst the population
everything and everybody is amongst the
population the question is why are the
Rockets now I bring you the dread news
that David Ward my parliamentary
colleague from Bradford East has has
after a day of rough treatment no doubt
categorically
apologized for the tweet that he made
yesterday I'm very sorry that he
categorically apologized for it and as I
said last night the synthetic
Rage of new
labor about what he said which was you
don't know it if I was living in Gaza
I'd be tempted to fire Rockets
two is identical almost word for word to
what Cher Blair
said almost a decade ago charer Blair
and the queen of Jordan having heard the
miserable stories that they heard
oped that the Wonder is not that some of
these people become suicide bombers the
Wonder is that more of them don't become
suicide bombers that's actually as
stronger statement than David Ward has
now been prevailed upon to
categorically apologize for and both
Jerry Blair and David Ward were merely
speaking the obvious
truth after all if you were
living in Gaza Under
Siege if your children had been killed
might be killed if your H had been might
be destroyed at any moment and you could
see through the wire the very land which
was yours and from which you were driven
CU there's another 80% in this story 80%
of the people of Gaza are
refugees they were never born in Gaza
they were driven to Gaza as refugees and
are now imprisoned within it and they
can see many of
them they can't see the village that
they left because that's been destroyed
and new cities built on top of it but
they can see the land that which was
once theirs and their
parents what would you do if it was you
would you take up arms against this sea
of troubles and try by opposing to end
them or would you what walk into the sea
and commit suicide if you did you'd be
shot before you go past shoulder
deep would you simply lie down
fatalistically and
accept 65 more more than 65 years of
this or would you
fight well some of you may be pacifists
I myself am not and unlike David W I
wouldn't just fire Rockets I'd fight
them with my bare hands if I could get
my hands on the people
responsible for these
crimes write that down somebody will
call on me to apologize tomorrow the one
thing you can be sure of I'll not be
apologizing categorically or otherwise
for
it no I'm
I'm
the
so learn how
to quickly and efficiently
deal with that charge there are no human
Shields there is no Army Palestinians
have no planes no anti-aircraft missiles
they have no ships they have nothing
except their small
arms and their Rockets now their Rockets
are militarily for the moment almost
entirely
ineffective hardly a single casualty I
think one dead uh has been wrecked by
these uh
Rockets but they do show as was pointed
out in an article by a pro Israel
columnist in the guardian
today that whilst still
asymmetrical that means
one-sided this military conflict is less
asymmetrical than it was before
because now they have to Scurry for
their a raid shelters in Tel Aviv and in
Jerusalem the resistance has the
distance it has no targeting mechanism
has no Precision in its Weaponry they're
extremely primitive but they can now
strike anywhere in Israel and of course
the resistance in the south of Lebanon
has onad missile technology that can
strike anywhere in Israel so though
while still asymmetrical as the
columnist put it today the conflict is
less asymmetrical than it was
before and in parenthesis reference to
the resistance in uh the south of
Lebanon let me make another
Point whilst every Muslim in aaza is a
Sunni
Muslim
none none of the Sunni Muslim regimes
have lifted a finger to help the
Palestinian people under bombardment not
one only two countries have militarily
made it possible for the resistance even
to have the bullets in their small
arms and those countries are Syria and
Iran whom Muslims are encouraged to hate
to regard as the devil so if you are a
Sunni Muslim in the audience tonight
think about that think about how utterly
absurd that kind of deliberate
division which
some seek to uh open up indeed look at
YouTube and see Isis the self-proclaimed
caliphate which burned the Palestinian
flag on top of a building in Aleppo uh
just the other day because for them
there are no countries there are no
flags and the Palestinian flag is no
different to any other flag see one
there that's certainly not how we see it
so um as I go through these issues uh
put up your hands if you if you want to
raise a question on any specific point
that I make I'm going to keep speaking
uh until someone uh does I want to move
on to the
media or the mijah
hadin it is a
peculiar
sadness that
the fourth
estate the British media
class has become so debased
so degraded that it would appear that
they are entirely
oblivious to
the linguistic crimes that they commit
every other
day I mean trky could write a book about
the use of language probably
is writing a book on this
conflict it reached the n here surely
when on Fox News where else John Kerry
who else the foreign Secretary of the
United States of America the greatest
most powerful country on the earth said
and I saw his lips move he really said
this Israel is under siege from
Hamas and just in case you missed it Fox
put it up as a banner underneath Israel
is under siege from
Hamas what kind of Madness is
this when the opposite is the truth some
of it
is so common place now that unless
you're looking out for it you could very
well miss
it Palestinians die whilst Israelis are
killed check it out when you see it
reported you'll see see
that Israeli soldiers were killed whilst
25 Palestinians died under the
bombardment speak
up others there you go even
worse Israel's operation is routinely in
in fact I think um
invariably referred to as an action
against against
militants when 75% of the people who
have been killed were women and
children how can a journalist write that
how can a journalist say
that they could say Israel claims that
its operation is aimed at militants
but the vast majority of those killed
are women and
children but they don't they repeat the
Calum that this is an
operation aimed at militants just coming
here on the BBC I
heard the BBC
newscaster
say we'll have reaction to the United
Nations
claims that Israel has committed war
crimes in
Gaza it's the United Nations that said
it for God sake I mean who would have to
write
it for the claim to be treated as a
finding
God God claimed that
Israel may have committed war crimes
would it have to be
that does any other finding by the
United Nations get treated as a
claim now one of the reasons for this my
comrade Sheamus Millan from the guardian
who would be with us except he's in
Colombia uh told me this long
ago that any journalist including him
pauses momentarily over their keyboard
before they type the word Israel or
Israeli on their computer because they
know that
automatically there will be an onslaught
an organized onslaught of of complaints
criticisms distortions
misrepresentations that they'll have to
deal with after they have done it well
of course one expects that one's
journalists would be made of Sterner
stuff than to therefore decline to do so
but many unfortunately are
not but here's an obvious area
of something that we can do because I'm
besieged by people asking me as many of
you will what can we do well one of the
things you can do is
complain and it works last
Saturday scores of thousands I don't
know how
many scores of thousands of people you
may have been amongst them were on the
Streets of London not a mile from the
BBC yet not 1 second of the footage
appeared on the BBC in fact on their
website which only belatedly reported it
they had to show a photograph branded
with the logo of Channel
4 so the BBC the world's great
Broadcasting
Corporation massively funded at your
expense didn't even send a Stills
photographer and had to use a picture
from the much smaller uh Channel
4 we
began the leaders of the anti-war
movement and the other organizations and
speakers from the platform and so on we
began to highlight that indeed the
public were already noticing
it and they deluged the BBC with
complaints and I as some of you may know
declared I'll not pay my license fee I
refuse to pay a license fee so so that
the British people can be lied to
systematically on my money and a lot of
people a lot are now contacting me to
say either that they're going to do the
same or that they have already begun
refusing to pay their license fee by
Sunday the BBC was giving the whole
thing rather more attention than it had
been on Saturday it
works and at the very least it will make
you feel better
i' carry no flag for uh Jon Snow at
channel 4 news but he hasn't half put
his reputation Skyhigh by the way that
he has reported this uh crisis so praise
people when they deserve to be praised
and criticize and attack their work uh
when
they
don't a lot of people are asking me if
we can send more convoys I'm sorry that
we cannot for a variety of
reasons first of all the first Convoy
went through North
Africa Libya had to be traversed 1,000
kilomet that's simply impossible
now in fact no one knows who is killing
whom in Libya that great success story
of the NATO intervention Libya was
pretty bad before is 10 times worse now
and nobody in their right mind would
attempt to take a convoy across Libya
and even if you
did the regime in Egypt would stop you
from Crossing just yesterday Tunisian
Airways sent a Plane full of medical
supplies from the people of
Tunisia and when it attempted to land in
Cairo it was refused permission to land
and
had to make a an urgent stop elsewhere
before flying back to Tunisia with all
the supplies still on
board and here our segue into
Egypt there are some
fools who
believed that the overthrow of
Mory was something worth
celebrating there are fools who told us
with
gusto that General CCE was the new
NASA there were liberals even
leftists on the
streets with the generals and the
Jun cheering their support for General
Cece and his military Jun it is now
clear that one at least of the purposes
of the overthrow of the Mori government
was so that Egypt could clear the decks
for this annihilation of the
Palestinians in Gaza don't get me
wrong I think Mory was a
turkey if you forgive the
metaphor I think he was a lousy
president I think he made every single
mistake it was possible to make in just
one
year but he wasn't overthrown
for those
reasons and he wasn't overthrown by
something
better and since CeCe came to power he
has not just massacred thousands and
thousands of
Egyptians tortured thousands more
incarcerated tens of thousands more than
25,000 he hasn't just sentenced to death
hundreds of people at one
sitting at the last count eight 80
people have been convicted and sentenced
to death in Egypt for the murder of one
police
officer must have been a hell of a
murder 880 people have been sentenced to
death for the murder of one
person he hasn't just done
that he has completed mubarak's
work of destroying the means of life of
the Palestinians in Gaza the tunnels
through which they were being fed and
supplied but he has been a
stalwart of the Israeli American
position in this conflict which leads me
to another point that people ask
me why did Hamas
refuse the ceas
fire that Egypt
negotiated well the answer is they
didn't negotiate it with anybody least
of all the Palestinians who are one of
the parties to the
fighting they heard Israel's demands
they consulted with the United States
and they issued what they called a call
for a
ceasefire the position of the
Palestinian resistance is obvious we
cannot stop fighting while your siege
continues we cannot stop fighting at
Egyptian instigation as long as Egypt is
sealing the border at Rafa and trapping
our people inside and trapping the means
of life for them
outside this is normal and not only did
Hamas say that but the PLO which is
dominated by the fata organization which
is the mainstream government
Authority in the Palestine Authority
based in rala the
PLO and Hamas have both said that this
conflict cannot end under a return to
the status quo ante because the status
quo an is death by a Thousand Cuts it's
the Warsaw
Ghetto which leads me to another
point is it all
Hamas you've heard me say this
before I'm not a supporter of Hamas I
don't actually even like
Hamas I wouldn't vote for them in 100
years but the people in Palestine did
vote for them and if we've learned one
thing in our long imperial history it
surely is that the only people who are
entitled to choose the leadership of any
people are that people
themselves in any case
much of the resisting is done not just
by Hamas but by many other organizations
Islamic organizations like Islamic Jihad
and others and leftist
organizations principally the popular
front for the liberation of Palestine
which has a very strong presence
actually in Gaza more in Gaza than
anywhere else amongst the people so
don't allow them to use Hamas as a short
hand in describing the Palestinian
people in
Gaza somebody just tweeted before I came
in his picture he said I'm in Gaza City
I'm hoping to
survive but if I don't tell them I
wasn't Hamas I wasn't a human shield I
was just a palestin
with The Misfortune to be in
Gaza most of the people in Gaza are not
in Hamas many of the people fighting in
Gaza are not Hamas the PLO supports the
stand of the Palestinian resistance in
Gaza towards this conflict so that's
another issue uh that I wanted to deal
with yes sister at the back I was going
to say
[Music]
no I don't uh first of all first of
all yeah I've got I've got your point
but you didn't hear what I said earlier
there are no Shia in Palestine there is
not a single there is not a there is not
a single Shiite Palestinian they don't
exist so there are no Shia militia and I
don't know what you mean by like
Iran but the first point that you made
is a good
one that the Palestinian people have to
unite themselves and guess what they had
just done
so which is one of the reasons for the
war finally a national Unity agreement
between Hamas and fata had been
reached and the president was about to
reopen his various organs of power in
Gaza Netanyahu said to Mahmud Abbas the
president of
Palestine you can choose Hamas or you
can choose peace laughably but you can't
have
both well Abbas did laugh finally and
said I don't see much peace so I will
have Hamas thank you very much and a
national Unity government was formed and
you're right it is absolutely vital that
the Palestinians have only one
address when Arafat was alive there was
only one address him with wherever he
happened to be dodging the bombs and the
bullets since arafat's death which was
one of the reasons for killing
him the Palestinians have been
thoroughly
divided and the house divided is a house
Gravely weakened but that is over now
and we now have a national Unity
government I wanted to come on to the
proximate cause of this
War seems a long time ago
now but three teenage
boys 16 years
old
settlers in the West Bank living near
Hebron in one of the most extreme
settlements anywhere to be
found were kidnapped and
murdered as it happens Israel knew that
they had been
murdered only an hour or two after the
crime had been
committed but they
deliberately inflated a propaganda
campaign bring back our boys whatever
happened to that Bring Back Our Girls by
the way whatever happened to those
Nigerian girls that Michelle Obama was
so occupied with so very briefly bring
back our boys was their campaign even
though they knew that they had been
killed murdered in a criminal act
they accused Hamas of having murdered
these three teenagers but to this day
they have not produced a single cintilla
of evidence even for the media never
mind a
court which places the responsibility
for that crime on Hamas in any case
whoever committed it by definition was
in the West Bank you can't get out of
Gaza so nobody in Gaza could have had
anything to do with that crime Israel
immediately began bombing Gaza and as
you know have now killed and maed
thousands uh of people and of course in
the immediate wake of the murder of the
three Israeli settler teenagers a
Palestinian teenager was abducted uh in
Jerusalem petrol was poured down his
throat and he was set on
fire nobody dreamt of destroying their
the Killer's parents' home nobody dreamt
of carpet bombing the neighborhood where
the killers of that Palestinian teenager
had come from nobody dreamt of
authorizing the murder of entirely
innocent people elsewhere because of the
cruel mother of that Palestinian boy yet
it has been
accepted as some kind of legitimate
response that three children are killed
in the West Bank so you can kill
hundreds of children in Gaza which by
definition had absolutely nothing to do
with it I want to come on now to the
things that we can
do we must continue these demonstrations
another demonstration of has been called
for Saturday it's vital that these
demonstrations are big and we have a
reputation to maintain and we want to uh
show other countries particularly Arab
countries uh where there are precious
few demonstrations the kind of scale of
the uprising that's taking place in
Europe and North America on this subject
yes the lady in second
ideology
ofed equality Beyond religion Beyond
race because this will happen next well
not every single person in here is
extremely
young there's a p of Mind John Bavon
there who's even older than me uh but uh
it's true that the majority of people
here are young and the majority of
people on the demonstrations are young
and that's our greatest asset we have
mobilized young people uh in huge
numbers and and all over the world which
is the reason I'm optimistic you should
not be pessimistic in fact when I
started in this struggle in 1975 you
could have fitted all the supporters of
the Palestinians in the whole of Britain
into this room and had room for several
elephants at the
back it was a very hot potato indeed to
say that you supported the PLO in
1975 now we are millions tens of
millions in this country and hundreds of
millions of people around the world so
actually actually you have nothing at
all to fear because the media knows even
if it ignores it the political class
knows even if for the moment they ignore
it the Israelis know that actually there
is a giant enormous swing in public
opinion in the world and even in the
United States and most importantly in
the United States the movement for
boycott divestment and sanctions in the
United States is growing a pace public
opinion in the United States even before
this latest crisis had moved into a
position where a majority of Americans
thought that the United States was
either too close to or far too too close
to Israel 55% uh said so uh and uh this
change in public opinion has been going
on since
1982 I'm in a position to chart that and
testify to that since the invasion of
Lebanon in 1982 and the massacres of
Sabra and chatila the bank balance
public opinion political capital of
Israel has been running down it's hard
for you to remember but some of us are
old the enough in here to remember when
Israel was a really popular country
left-wing people left University and
went to go and live on
kibuts and thought that they were
practicing
socialism we pointed out at the time
that the kibuts are to socialism as a
group of Thieves agreeing to share their
spoils equally but not many people saw
it that way trade
unions almost all of them had the
closest possible relation relationship
with the Israeli trade
unions and Israel seemed like a really
hip
swinging liberal place in an Arab world
that people saw as backward and
reactionary in the 1960s and even into
the 1970s Israel was enormously popular
in the world now it is the most
unpopular country in the world and as I
said on Saturday people still move yes
for
Israel but in Shakespeare's words they
move not out of love they move out of
interest and interests can change and
are changing even Kerry just before he
went on to make that ludicrous statement
that Israel was under
siege by the Palestinians was caught
on tape though not on
air cursing the Israeli attack on Gaza
that's their real attitude we have to
turn that real attitude into their
public attitude or just a year or two
ago maybe more
sarosi and uh and Obama were caught
similarly on tape discussing
Netanyahu and sarosi said thinking the
mic was not live I can't stand to look
at netanyahu's face he's such a
liar and Obama said you can't stand to
look at his face what about me I have to
deal with him every day that's their
real
attitude and I happen to know because
I've long before he was president I have
personally talked to Obama on a
demonstration for fully 25 minutes about
Palestine and he told me
that the late and great Professor Edward
S schooled me educated me on every
aspect of this conflict so he doesn't
have The Alibi the last guy did of being
an
imbecile Obama knows very well what the
truth is so all over the world public
opinion is with us and Swinging
massively uh with us and this horrific
series of of massacres and killings uh
can only have hastened the day when the
real attitude of our leaders becomes the
actual public uh attitude the gentleman
in the front yeah
I know it well
yeah right now
from
and resistance is coming
from we support only stand us and
you know just wait for
the well he has I mean I'm the last
person to uh jump to Abu mazen's defense
uh I can hardly believe I'm about to say
what I'm about to say but he has
actually uh and the PLO did endorse the
stand of the resistance in Gaza in
refusing this so-called ceasefire offer
from Egypt
and he is meeting caring now and I hope
he is insisting on the terms of a
military uh sensation because and you'll
know this very well uh when you are
bombing people from uh the skies you you
you're shooting fish in a battle you're
killing people who can't possibly fight
you back but once your soldiers go in on
the ground then you're up close and
personal and the resistance is done very
well ever since this ground Invasion
took place they have been taking a to on
the Invader and many of the Invaders
don't want to be there some of them are
talking about it when they come out and
seeing so one of them has been captured
and it will now be the new
Shalit uh so the
resistance uh
militarily has fought well and bravely
uh since this GR
Invasion and the PLO are supporting them
uh which is a measure of how things have
changed since this Unity agreement it's
up to the Palestinians to choose their
leaders I did not choose either Hamas or
Mahmud Abbas and I wouldn't have voted
for either of them but the Palestinians
have to get their democracy back you see
abas I'm calling him the president he's
not actually the president his term as
president ended long
ago isma Hanah the prime minister in
Gaza is no longer the Prime Minister his
term ended a long time ago in any case
the West Bank and Gaza are not all of
Palestine and the people under
occupation or Siege are only a small
fraction of the Palestinian
people 34s of the Palestinians are not
living under occupation at all they're
living as refugees in camps in the
countries nearby by or in Exile around
the world like
you
and in the old days before Oslo the PLO
represented all the Palestinians
wherever they were in the world and the
political balance on the executive
committee was carefully chosen to
reflect the relative strength of the
political Trends within the Palestinian
national movement and that has to uh be
done again on your second point about
the Arab leader
I mean don't get me
started uh it is somewhere
between
pitiful and
unbelievable that not a
single leader not one has been able to
even bring themselves to say anything
never mind do anything meaningful about
this catastrophe indeed some of them are
openly
collaborating With the Enemy in this
murderous assault erdogan has made some
very good statements in the last 48
hours they would be more is the Turkish
prime minister soon to be president they
would be more credible if Turkey did not
maintain diplomatic relations with
Israel have a military alliance with
Israel perform war games with Israel and
they would be more powerful if Israel
was not getting its oil shipped through
Turkish ports from baran's oil fields in
the north of Iraq in the Kurdish area
but nonetheless what he has said is
right and it should be supported but
turkey is not an Arab country and Iran
is not an Arab country but they are the
only two that are uh seeing anything
where are the Arabs where are the Arab
leaders it's not that this is just an
Arab issue it's not that this is just a
Muslim issue but you would have thought
the Arabs and Muslims would be in the
front line instead of Western public
opinion in the front line yes
sirra but he has had to stand down
because of the the Israel Lobby in the
United States so what can be to weaken
this influence of the isra lited
states well first of all Obama doesn't
have to do
anything he's the most powerful
individual on the earth those who argue
that you know he's just a puppet and has
big forces and powers and so on that
manipulate that's just nonsense if Obama
wanted to he could do so not least
because he's in the second term of his
presidency he will never stand for
election again why doesn't he
actually secure some kind of Legacy by
telling the truth at least a truth which
I've already told you he absolutely
knows it's not that he's ignorant uh of
it but there is of course an Israel
Lobby and here we need to again uh make
some important points first of all the
vast majority of the people in the
Israel Lobby in the United States are
not Jews you do not have to be a Jew to
be a Zionist and many Jews are not
zionists and you've seen the rabbis on
our
demonstrations and there are many
secular and there are many many secular
and Progressive and leftist Jews uh
around the world World maybe in this
room all over the movement uh the vast
majority of the people in the Israel
Lobby in the United States are fanatic
Christians fanatic Christian
zionists and there's 60 or 70 million of
those and that's where their
power arises because if you've got tens
of millions of votes that you can
mobilize if you can raise tens hundreds
of millions of dollars for political
campaigns then you're a powerful
operation but of course however many
there are there are many more who are
not however much money they've got if
the rest of us put our mind to it we
could do better let's take
Britain let's
assume that 50% of the Jews in Britain
are Zionist supporters of Israel it
would be more than that but let's assume
it 50% of the Jews in Britain equals
100,000 people there's only 200,000 Jews
in the United Kingdom there's 2 million
Muslims in the United
Kingdom most Jews are middle class only
a few Jews are Mega
rich but of the 2 million Muslims in
Britain there are some of the most
wealthy people in the
country and when you talk about Muslim
money in Britain
I was once asked by a son of shik
Z how come the Israeli Lobby is so much
better than our lobby I said we don't
have a lobby but within a mile of this
restaurant there are Arabs throwing
millions of pounds on the casino tables
in the gambling joints of London that
could pay for 10 lobbies in other words
the point I'm making is we mustn't be
fatalistic about this that they have all
the power they have all the m money they
control this they control that in fact
every one of these areas could and must
and is being contested and it needs to
be contested more uh fiercely because
the
politicians don't say what they must
know to be true because they're
scared we've got to make them scared of
not doing
so we've got to make them that's why
David Ward said what he
said because we're breathing down his
neck in Bradford East and because there
are a lot of Muslim voters there I don't
know what they'll think of him now that
he's categorically apologized I hope I
know what they'll think of that
categoric apology but we have to make
all these politicians scared they've got
to know that if they don't stand up on
this they can forget about our votes
they can forget about our contribution
they can forget about trying to recruit
us to their parties and that's the
spirit and the mentality that we must uh
adopt whatever differences there are
between us I mean frankly you couldn't
get a more divided people than the
Jews the Jewish political class hates
each other with a Vengeance that makes
your eyes water they punch each other in
the parliament they are extremely
divided but they're United on one
thing namely the interests of the state
of isra Israel and we have to get into a
situation where whatever our difference
is we are united on one thing which is
the opposite of the thing that they are
united upon let's take some more from
the body of the hall the young lady in
the black dress I think yes
well um most of the Angry Young Muslim
men are being seduced into other
conflicts I talked about the inability
of a convoy going through Libya the
European route is also closed to us
because it requires us to go through
Syria and self-evidently we could not do
so not least because of the presence of
several hundred reportedly uh young
angry and extremized radicalized Muslim
youth from Britain and many other uh
countries so I doubt if there's a big
pool uh on young people here in Britain
to go and fight in Palestine in any case
they would not be able to do so they
would not be able ble to get there but I
do I can tell you that there are a
significant number of British Jews
currently fighting in Gaza in the
Israeli Army and I'm wondering if
they're going to be arrested when they
come back to London Airport for
participating in Foreign
Wars but you're you're right that we
have to give people uh things to do and
many are already uh coming up with their
own ideas for example a young man wrote
to me the other day he's organizing a a
car cavalcade on the Eid day for
Palestine uh a lot of people drove to
the demonstration in Convoy from
different parts of the north uh last
Saturday and we do again this Saturday
local protests and demonstrations are
being organized uh all over the place
people are raising money they ask me
where it should go I always say interpal
Interpol is the best
of the Charities processing uh donations
that will get uh to the people on the
ground in in Gaza uh and many people are
organizing fundraising efforts and I
urge them to do so and to channel it
through
interpal uh there are also other mundane
things well they're not really mundane
but they can seem it a young man went
into tesos this week wearing a
t-shirt cursing the
massacre in Gaza tesos asked him to
leave the store was it Tesco or was it
Asda was Tesco
Asda
sorry no I'm coming on to Tesco I'm
coming on to
Tesco Asda asked them to leave people
should not go to Asda and tell Asda why
they're no longer going to Asda tesos is
already subject of a boycott because of
the proliferation
of goods on sale often improperly marked
in their store from the occupied
Palestinian land and there's blood on
their oranges there's blood on their
ketts and other things that they are
selling you can boycott things yourself
and you can go and stand outside the
store and try and persuade other people
not to go into the store and for the
following reasons yes the gentleman in
the white white shop yeah really
question just kind of examp
talking stud and what we
goodan
solidity what happened
isra might have it brought into bright
and what was quite what was quite moving
actually theef response that we had from
socialist tra unist and Muslims Arabs
everyone who came down outside you know
made a said you know
is not welcome here in bright and after
two long years of doing that you know
the sign came down and we made it clear
and bright that like George said those
products and those people who support
that have blood on their hands and blood
on very well said very well said and as
was pointed out uh by one of the
speakers at one of the recent
demonstrations Soda Stream which thought
it was on a real winner bying engaging
the lovely Scarlet Johansson as their
face have ended up virtually bankrupt
because they drew attention and her uh
problems with Oxfam Drew attention to
the fact that actually their product is
made in illegally occupied territory and
their share prices haved and nobody
wants to buy a soda I don't know why
anyone's still buying soda streams
anyway but uh their business has been
wrecked by it so we can achieve uh
things with this yes the gentleman at
the three from the back
yeah well you can pick and choose I I'm
an advocate of the view that if you try
to boycott everything you'll end up
boycotting nothing uh so you can uh pick
and choose uh products but we should all
pick and choose the same uh products if
we can we should try to mainstream
particular
targets uh somebody I saw had a great
agitation the other day around St laer
don't paint your face with Palestinian
blood EST ler is a huge uh backa of the
state of Israel uh and there are plenty
of other Alternatives nobody has to buy
EST ler cosmetics and nobody should and
these are obvious targets I'm not myself
the expert or the Oracle uh on this but
there are plenty of places on the
internet where you can get the uh the
best targets for a boycott and the best
one is
obviously where the product is well
known uh where there are alternatives so
you're not asking someone to give up a
particular thing altogether just to buy
somebody else's rather than theirs and
which is a household name so that we can
all rally behind it but the point that
the young man made about Brighton is a
very good one because uh I said this
during castled but to my horror it's
still happening in Westfield both
westfields in London and elsewhere there
is still something calling itself the
Israel shop which uh waylays people
walking by often Muslims by the way uh
and tries to sell them salts and various
skin products and so on from the Dead
Sea from the occupied Dead Sea a dead
sea which they have
stolen and I don't know why I do it
every time I they don't approach me now
because uh perhaps they think my skin
could not be improved but uh I give them
and my children give them such a dirty
look they they they stay away from us
but they don't stay away from everybody
and they get you talking they sell your
products and they then tell you because
I've tested this using a willing
volunteer uh what do you know about
Israel if you ever visited Israel if you
thought about a holiday in Israel so on
uh everybody who comes across these
outfits should condemn them should shun
them and should protest to the store I
mean westfields would actually collapse
if it wasn't for Muslim clients yet
they're allowing uh this pure Israel
operation to take place uh in the malls
and that's an obvious uh Target for a
successful boycott I think yes with the
glass the the
bandana I don't think you can hold them
accountable able in a court of laww uh
David Cameron has a parliamentary
majority uh he's entitled therefore to
uh set government policy
and well I don't I don't think there's
any way we can hold Netanyahu uh
accountable in a in a court Israel is
not a signator to the ICC and in any
case he's the wrong color to be taken
before the IC because you have to be
black and you have to be African uh in
order to be tried at the uh ICC I'm all
for efforts that are made we did
successfully Kate and Andrew will recall
uh get a a magistrate actually to issue
a warrant for uh was it Livy and uh
mofas I think uh two Israeli criminals
anyway we got a magistrate in
Westminster to issue a warrant and they
had to scarper out the country but the
government then changed the law uh that
this could no longer be
and they can do so because they have a
majority in Parliament to change the law
and they and they did
yes uh they said uh and this is the
point I was making that the BBC referred
to them as claims in fact they weren't
claims they were a finding uh by the
United Nations human rights organization
that Israel may be guilty of war crimes
I don't know where the maybe comes in
and I don't know where the description
of it as a claim uh comes in uh but I I
don't myself believe there are others
here who know the United Nations better
than me but I myself don't think that
anything will come of that Israel has
been guilty of crimes war crimes crimes
against humanity human rights violations
and absolute Defiance of the security
Council itself uh in dozens of cases and
for almost half a century uh and nothing
has happened to them so that will not
change until the politics in the
countries change and the governments
that make up the United Nations have to
take a different line and if you think
that that's impossible Ponder the
presence of his Excellency here
Venezuela was once a right-wing
reactionary uh
feudal uh and often dictatorial uh State
now Venezuela is the hope of the
world
Bolivia
Bolivia Bolivia Ecuador Chile has
severed relations like Venezuela did 5
years ago Chile has now sever relation
relationss uh with Israel and called for
a boycott of Israeli goods and uh there
are many others uh where we're on the
March and on the move and we have to
make that count in Britain too gentleman
in the white uh top with the
glasses hisory
they
still
do well well well first of all uh we did
not stop the Iraq War but the movement
that we built against the Iraq War
stopped the Syrian War that's the first
part
so the reason the reason we had majority
of 13 votes against going to war on
Syria was not just because of the debate
was not just because of the um the
petitioning and letters and calls and so
on that members of the public were
flooding in on the day of the debate but
because all the MPS even those who voted
for the war in Syria had in their mind
that the Iraq War had been such a
disaster the movement against it had
been so right that they weren't prepared
to easily take the risk of doing so uh
again but the second point I make will
depend on whether or not you are a
Believer if you're a Believer as I am
then I believe that on the Judgment Day
I'll be asked what I did I won't be
asked what you did and I'll be able to
say if I'm
asked what what did you do when the
Palestinians were being massacred in
Gaza I'll be able to say truthfully that
I used every breath that I had to try
and stop it on the streets in the market
in the parliament in every
way in in in every way that I can so
you'll feel better about yourself if
you're a Believer you'll have a better
chance on the last day and don't think
that demonstrations achieve nothing they
may not achieve something today but they
definitely affect what happens tomorrow
yes gentleman in the blue shirt second
from the
back this is a referen to the American
quote unquote comedian uh Bill Mahar who
used to be a
liberal uh was one of the Christopher
Hitchens uh Brigade in the unit United
States and therefore portrayed himself
called himself no doubt thought himself
to be a liberal uh but he has been over
the last few years drifting headlong
into more and more extreme uh
islamophobic uh and right-wing extremism
and I was Pro I was provoked into
challenging him to a public debate
pay-per-view he could do whatever he
liked with the money he raised I'd put
the money I raised into our
movement uh he has not uh taken up I was
provoked by an exchange between him and
the simply wonderful Frankie Bole
Frankie Bole has
been Frankie Bo has weaponized humor in
a way that I have never seen before if
you don't know what I mean check them
out but Mahar said you know dealing with
Hamas it's like dealing with a
hysterical woman you can hold on to our
lapels you can shake her but eventually
you may have to hit her that's what he
said
Mah and Bo said in response I hear you
man it's amazing that some of these
women after you bombed and killed their
children and destroyed their houses you
have to hit them before they hit you it
was a brilliant exchange and I
challenged Maha uh to debate this with
me I said you seem to like slapping
women around why don't you try me uh on
live pay-per-view television let's see
who turns up but he's gone to ground as
far as I know he has not issued a single
tweet since but I'm Looking For You Maha
if you hear this I'm looking for you
uh gentleman in the blue top
yeah
supp still
more disgusting is what
those when Israel is bombing the
Palestinians from the I want everyone
know that of the Contra we
are when
isra from the sea we giving them
compon so it isn't just words a lot of
the things involved in this current Mass
a lot of the components are going to
have
exactly you're absolutely right and even
worse these licenses were
issued after British government
acceptance of Israeli government
assurances that the weapons would not be
used either for external aggression or
internal
repression I wonder therefore what they
would be used for
and I wonder how any civil servant with
a straight face could have signed that
off even
worse we're not just selling weapons to
Israel we are buying even more weapons
from Israel indeed much of the world is
now buying weapons from Israel it is one
of the emerging merchants of death in
the world uh selling billions tens of
billions of dollars worth of weapons
every year indeed it's one of the things
that's keeping the uh State
afloat uh David Cameron said and I quote
that he stood
staunchly behind Israel Ed Milan said on
the front page of the Jewish Chronicle I
am a Zionist Nick CLE threatened David
Ward with expulsion from the party
unless he categorically
apologized three cheeks of the same ARS
as as I always put it and they will
continue to be unless they think that it
will not profit them politically to
continue on this line why should they
stop think about it these are totally
unprincipled opportunistic people I mean
Ed Mand isn't even a Zion I don't
believe for one minute that he's a
Zionist it's even worse than that he
pretended to be
and he and he did
so people say to me well he's a Jew so
what his mother and father were Jews and
neither of those would ever have
described themselves as Zionist indeed
they would have defined themselves as
anti-zionist that's why I'm pretty sure
he isn't a Zionist but he thought there
was more in it for him to claim to be a
Zionist than there would have been to
state that he was an anti Zionist and
that's the equation we have to change
that's the Paradigm we have to
change uh yes yes
mam
think racism and particular
and
it
we
and of those ideas that we're all
dividing but also that we continue to
stand side by side
excellent excellent I I couldn't put
that better so I won't uh
try anyone else want to make a
contribution ask a question yes
gentleman right in the middle there with
the greenish top on yeah
uh well end is uh a moot point um it's
not going to end it may
pause and it may pause quite soon after
all now that Israel is losing for them
significant numbers on the
battlefield in addition to the shock to
their system that Palestinian Rockets
can now reach far and wide Israel's much
more in the mood for a pause than it
would have been a week ago and John
Kerry has gone to the region and is
engaging in shuttle diplomacy you might
say many weeks too late uh so it's quite
possible that there will be a pause but
it will only be a pause unless the siege
is lifted and unless there's a political
solution uh to this crisis uh then it
will only have been a pause and will be
back here in a year or two or three uh
discussing exactly the same things which
is probably a good point for me to uh
Advance uh what I believe is the
solution because some people say we're
long on condemnation and criticism and
so on but short on um on
solution well for me and I've been in
this next year for 40 years that's a
long time to be in a
struggle I have returned to the belief
that I had right at the very
beginning that there is no
possibility of this conflict being
solved except on the basis of a single
Democratic State between the river and
the Sea I'm absolutely convinced of that
the the so-called two State
solution isn't a solution at all and is
in any case a
chimera the West Bank and Gaza are
entirely distinct and separate
Geographic locations separated by
Mainland so-called Israel in other words
they are not contiguous territory
therefore a two-state
solution uh which involved the West Bank
and Gaza would have the West Bank and
Gaza entirely separated by Israeli
land in any case what was the West Bank
has now been massively seized and
settled by illegal Israeli settlements
and here's a point maybe some of you
hear this word settlement you kind of
think of log cabins and uh and uh
horsedrawn wagons and so on these are
cities these Israeli settlements are
like Beverly Hill
using sprinklers on their lawns when
Palestinians can't get water beautiful
Apartments given free or at hugely
subsidized rates uh by the Israeli
government paid for by the US taxpayer
and every one of these settlements has
Jews only roads uh leading up to them
from which the Palestinians are excluded
all over the West Bank are hundreds and
hundreds of checkpoints there's the
aparte wall there's the insistence of
Netanyahu that they will never allow
control of the Jordan Valley out of
their hands the more you talk about it
the more you realize that actually there
isn't even the land left even though it
isn't contiguous that you could have a
two-state solution but the most
important reason why it isn't a solution
is that it has no Prospect of that man
there returning home
it has within it no possibility of the
majority of Palestinians returning home
now some people say well this one state
solution is pretty far-fetched but so is
the two- State solution but at least the
one state solution has the benefit of
being a
solution
and unless the solution allows every
Palestinian who's been driven from their
land and their home to return
then it isn't a solution at all and I'm
not one of those there may be some in
here I'm not one who say that the
Israelis have to go home go home where
most of the Israelis were now born
there Poland Russia France England
America is no longer their home they
have a right to remain there but they
don't have the right to remain in
somebody else's house on somebody else's
land they'll have to be the ones who
build a new city in the
netive because they have to give back
the land and the property that was
stolen to the people from whom it was
stolen so to me as someone who was
deeply involved in the struggle against
aparta in South Africa I'm very clear
that one man one woman one vote that's
the only basis that we can support any
state
and it can be called Israel Palestine it
can be called Palestine Israel according
to your point of view or it can be
called something else but it will have
to involve those with a right to return
there being able to return there and
those Jews and there will be many in
post- aarte South Africa half of the
whites left and half remained it'll
probably be something like that half of
the Jews come currently in Israel will
probably decide that if it's not going
to be a Jews only state a state of the
Jewish people where exclusivist and
anti-democratic practices the norm they
don't want to live there anymore okay
bye-bye then they can go anywhere that
they like uh but the half that might
remain might well find that actually
that's a much much better state to live
in a democratic State rather than an
aparte State certainly would be to me
okay I've got time for one or two more
and then I'll need to wrap it up Emy
that's not been in yet yes gentleman in
the second row i' just like to know the
thoughts on the
timing I do think that the prospect of a
national Unity government and the horror
with which Netanyahu received it uh is a
major factor in the launching of this
assault but as chairman Mau once said
sometimes the enemy struggles mightily
to lift a huge Stone only to drop it on
its own feet and if so that's exactly
what's happened here because the unity
of the Palestinians has been deepened
and strengthened by this assault which
may in part have been launched uh partly
because uh of that uh that
Unity any more that hasn't been in the
gentleman in the suit there just cuz
he's wearing a suit I like a man in a
suit
well I'm open to suggestions if
anybody's got a better idea but in the
absence of better ideas I'll be walking
I'll be marching I'll be tweeting I'll
be Facebooking I'll be phoning to
complain I'll be pressing in Parliament
I'll be trying to persuade people's uh
turn people's opinions unless someone's
got a better opinion that's what I'll be
doing
educate educ this is my maximum all of
my life educate agitate
organize and I think this meeting is
part of
that well I should have mentioned
[Applause]
that as it I didn't plan her to say that
I I I don't even know her support your
fil giving you money thank
you I'm
uh I'm very well on the way to producing
a blockbuster
90minut indictment of Tony Blair it's a
film called the killing of Tony Blair it
doesn't it doesn't involve me killing
Tony Blair it would be an even more
successful movie if it did but it charts
the killings of Tony Blair the killing
of the labor party as we knew it the
killing of a million people and more in
the bush and Blair Wars and the
financial killing that he's been making
out of both ever since
100 million seven houses outside of
which I have filmed all seven of them
some of them would make your eyes water
uh I don't know what the idea of seven
houses is one for every day of the week
or what uh we are on his case big time
and the film has now been taken up
pardon me uh with a Hollywood uh
distributor it's going to be very big in
indeed on both sides of the Atlantic and
it will be launched will be
premiered at the International Film
Festival in Austin
Texas
within within sound of the
ranch Bush's Ranch early next year
thanks for giving me the opportunity
because I forgot to
mention thank you
should we
uh should we finish on that note I think
um because it's almost uh 8:30 uh those
who are fasting have to get somewhere
where they can break their fast in a
little over half an hour uh thank you
all for coming I hope you found it
useful a kind of
teaching uh rather than uh platform
speech I hope you found that convivial
and if his Excellency agrees
we'll call another one soon but by the
way this shows this shows the power
hello counselor how are you this shows
the power of social media this audience
and the equal or more audience that
didn't get in all came here directly
from social media not a leaflet was
distributed not a poster was posted not
an advert was purchased this is the
future thanks very much indeed thank you