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Dozens of Gazans die in shooting near to aid convoy
00:31:39
Israel says its troops fired warning shots but rejects Palestinian death figures
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Alex Ritson
This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the uk. We finally switched to T Mobile because they know that those of us here and there want to stay well connected. Let's watch a movie. Thanks to T Mobile we get Netflix included so we can all enjoy our favorite shows and movies. Quinta lista bacanissima perojalari. Now the hard part is getting them to agree on a movie. Switch today and get a Samsung Galaxy S25 plus with Galaxy AI on us plus your plan. Prize is guaranteed for five years, save today, guarantee for tomorrow. Tap the banner to learn more or visit a store. Guarantees monthly price of contacts and data exclusions like taxes and fee supply. See exclusions and details@t mobile.com this is the Global News podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Alex Ritson and in the early hours of Monday 21st July, these are our main stories. Dozens of Palestinians have died in another shooting close to a UN aid convoy in Gaza. Israel says its troops fired warning shots but rejects Palestinian figures on the numbers of dead. Japan's Prime Minister says he intends to stay in office despite his coalition failing to secure a majority in elections to the upper house. There are reports of renewed violence in outlying villages of Suwayda Province in Syria. Also in this podcast, the American D Day veteran and social media star Papa Jake Larson dies at the age of 102. Every person that landed on Omaha beach on D Day came through these fingers. These fingers I'm showing you right now. Type their name. We look back at his extraordinary life at the weekend. Almost 175 Palestinians were killed in Gaza by Israeli gunfire and airstrikes, according to medics and Hamas officials. More than half died on their way to an aid site or waiting for aid and some were killed near distribution centers run by the US and Israeli backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. Imad Kuday is a student living in an Al Mawasi humanitarian camp near the southern Gaza border. He recorded a one day audio diary for the BBC. Here's an excerpt. The gate of our camp right now is targeted by one of the Israeli drones. They tell us that the children have been killed. The community kitchen is targeted, but we can see this is happening every day. Israel doesn't allow international journalists, including ones from the BBC, to report from Gaza. Our correspondent in Jerusalem, Yo Lanternel, is monitoring developments and she told us what the World Food Program had told journalists. Shortly after entering Gaza, one of its convoy of 25 lorries carrying food aid encountered what it said were massive crowds of hungry civilians who then came under gunfire now, we can't verify the exact numbers of those killed, but certainly we've seen footage from our trusted freelance colleagues at Shifa Hospital in Gaza City that show a stream of bodies of young men or teenage boys brought in with many of the wounded, too. And the Israeli military is saying its troops had fired warning shots towards a crowd of thousands in this part of northern Gaza, saying this was to remove what it said was an immediate threat. And it said its initial findings suggested that the casualty figures that have been reported have been inflated. It said it certainly does not intentionally target humanitarian aid trucks. And we're also hearing six other people who are killed near another aid site in the south. That's according to the health officials. We've not yet seen an Israeli military comment on that. And there were about a dozen people also said to have been killed in other Israeli attacks across Gaza in the course of the day. Many of the fatalities are connected to aid. It's hard, I know, for you to accurately assess offence, but what do you read into this pattern? This was one of the highest reported death tolls. We've had these repeated almost daily, cases in which aid seekers have been killed. And if you add this latest bloodshed to UN figures that were circulating last week, that brings the number of Palestinians reportedly killed waiting for aid in about two months to close to 1,000. The biggest numbers killed more 700, according to, you know, the figures I'm trying to stay across were in the vicinity of sites run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. Its operations have been very controversial. Although it's backed by Israel and the us, it operates exclusively in these Israeli military zones, mainly in the south of the Strip. And that is where we've seen a number of times now, Israeli fire at civilians. The Israeli military saying it's investigating these reports of casualties. But all of this happening as the aid situation becomes more and more desperate in Gaza and having more and more warnings now of thousands of people who are suffering from the effects of malnutrition. Yoland, Nell. Well, one Gaza resident who says she isn't eating regular meals is Garda Al Hord, a journalist in Gaza City. I'm speaking to you and I have terrible headache. Since two days, we didn't eat anything. Nothing, Nothing. Nothing to be eaten here in Gaza. Like for me, for my daughters, for anyone. We just drink water all the time. If we want to go to the local market, it run out from any kind of food. If you find something, it's very expensive, really. We are dying people. They are just collapsing while they are going or Walking in the street, I can't find words to describe my situation today. We didn't eat anything. We were looking in the market, nothing. They don't have anything, they don't have money, they don't have cash, they don't have food. How they can manage, how they are running after the water truck just to get some water. We can see the kids they are chasing, they are looking in the garbage, in the street for anything to eat. Mothers, they are chasing people and they are calling anyone just to help them to feed their kids. I hope the ceasefire will be signed this week and I hope the humanitarian aid will come through the crossing. Anything that could save our lives. This is like a message from me on behalf of my people. Like it's two years now of suffering and I hope anyone can hear us, can listen to us and stop the starvation. If you are not able to stop the killing, the war, just stop the starvation. We want to eat. Gaza journalist Ghada Al Khord The Israeli authorities have proposed a so called humanitarian city for Palestinians to be established after the conflict ends. James Nocatee asked the former UN Undersecretary for Humanitarian affairs and Aid Coordinator Martin Griffiths about aid in Gaza. The situation at the moment, humanitarian terms in Gaza is on a precipice because the aid trickling in is a trickle and people are starving to death. Malnutrition is a huge primary problem now as reported by msf. So it's desperate and I think it's the slow death of the Gazan people, which we are simply watching from the sidelines. And the humanitarian cities, Jim, is an extraordinary arrangement or proposal because of course it lures people in, it security checks them before they get into the humanitarian cities. It doesn't let them out. Which is why some Israeli senior people like Ehud Olmet and others are talking about it as a concentration camp which has, you know, extraordinary resonances and it's a preliminary to deportation and it's, you know, people need to eat so they may be tempted by this. So I think it's an absolute affront not just to humanitarian principles, but to all our feelings of norms and values in solidarity. Because it's a staging post to forced exile. Yes, that's really what it is. It's not a humanitarian city. It is exactly that and it's nakedly and unashamedly that which I find even more alarming in a way. I don't know what, what we're all supposed to do when this set of cities is set up. Are we supposed to, you know, Encourage people to go there, just sit back and say, please don't. What's going to be the international opinion, the United nations and others, about this crime? Probably a war crime, I'm not sure. It's certainly a crime against humanitarian and human rights law. So what are we going to do about it? Maybe this time we'll do more than just express concern. Martin Griffiths James also spoke to Fleur Hassan Nahum, a spokesperson for the Israeli government. I think that this whole thing is a huge tragedy. And the reason why we're here two years later is because Hamas, a genocidal terrorist group that raped women and children and killed and beheaded people, and they're killing their own people. In fact, till today, people going to get humanitarian aid, they're still in power, they still holding Israeli living hostages. So you must understand that if the UK were in a situation where a foreign country was holding onto their hostages after the worst massacre in 100 years, that Israel can't just sit and wait for that massacre to happen again. Suddenly we need to get our hostages back. The estimates are there are probably 20 living hostages and the remains of others still. Still there. And that is a fact which everybody who looks at it for 10 seconds understands. But we also see, and I've just got to put this to you bluntly, that according to the Red Cross, it's a very reputable organization. Nearly half a million people think I could argue with you about. Well, let's. Okay, we'll let the listeners decide about what they think of the Red Cross. Half a million people facing starvation in the south. More than 60% of buildings damaged or destroyed. Food and water are scarce. How do you justify that assault on an entire population in which, as the Pope pointed out the other day, children and the elderly are suffering most profoundly? Well, first of all, I want to push back because we've been hearing this libel of starvation already for two years. Every three months there's a new report that says they're on the brink of starvation and somehow, miraculously, you think it's fine. You think they've got lots of food? No. All I can tell you is this. The Gaza Humanitarian foundation, which was set up for one main purpose, to give food that doesn't get into the hands of the terrorists who sell the food to their own people and other ones who are starving their own people. Since they were set up a few months ago, and I've spoken to very senior people who are running this incredible operation, there's been 52 million meals given out. Now, how do you reconcile that Fact that statistic that can be proven with the libel of starvation. Well, I have to answer your question. No, no, I lost their main source of funding. I have to answer your question and your challenge that they steal their main source of fund and they're doing everything, including ramping up the propaganda in order to get back the. I'm sorry, there are British. There are British and international doctors, medics and people who have gone there to help, who are trustworthy people, and they are appalled by what they see. They can't believe it. That a place with 2 million people in it. And we know about Hamas. We know the awful things they did. There's no argument about that. You're quite right about that. Those massacres were dreadful. No, I'm not. Let them stay there. No, but you can do it without starving. No, no, but you see that. Well, as Martin Griffith has pointed out there, you're suggesting humanitarian camps. Well, one of your former prime ministers described them the other day as concentration camps. Not me. That's him. This is the former prime minister that was in jail, so I wouldn't take him too seriously. Ultimately. Well, he was in jail. Ultimately, what I can tell you is that this, you can't win. Because if we. The main challenge that exists in Gaza today is separating the terrorists who kill their own people from the regular innocent people that have suffered tremendously. How do we do that? So when you create humanitarian zones, they come and smuggle themselves into the humanitarian zones. Well, but of course, you don't let them out. Nobody's an expert, but nobody has any actual practical ideas about how to get rid of Hamas. Israeli government spokesperson Fleur Hassan Nahum talking to James Nocatee as we record this podcast. There are reports of renewed violence in outlying villages of the Syrian province of Suwayda, despite a ceasefire that brought a brief halt to a week of deadly clashes between the Druze and Bedouin communities. More than 1100 people have been killed in the fighting. We've been hearing from one man caught up in the violence, a member of the Druze community. He had been visiting family in northern Sowet when the clashes broke out. He's asked to remain anonymous and says he's been sheltering with his elderly parents ever since. About 500 meters only from my house. My family are there. The children are screaming. Whole night yesterday till 3am now. The situation is fine. We don't know what happened last night. They attacked us from this side. Then the smallest villages being born. They burn it, they burn it. We see the fire and we were waiting them to reach us. We don't know where to go. A resident from the Druze community in Sueda province, There have been fears the sectarian violence could spiral into a wider regional crisis. The US has urged the Syrian government to take steps to stabilize the area and ensure the safety of civilians. Our correspondent John Donason has been close to the city and sent this report. In Sawaida province, a show of force from Bedouin gunmen. We were there as hundreds of fighters fired into the air in defiance. We found the Bedouin massed on the road. At the last government checkpoint before Suaida city, one tribal elder told me for now, they were observing the ceasefire but would go back in if what they called Bedouin hostages were not brought out. If the Druze don't commit to the deal, we will re enter Suaida again, he said, even if it becomes our cemetery. The city is now controlled by the Druze. Residents say there is a tense calm, but no electricity or running water. And with food Running short, the UN says more than 130,000 people have been displaced. At a school now acting as a makeshift shelter just outside the city, we met Bedouin families who had fled their homes with nothing. I asked Tenaya Romay Saifan whether Drus and Bedouin could ever live side by side again. No, no, no, not possible, she said as the crowd backed her up. You can't trust the Druze. They are traitors. For now, the government does seem to have enforced some sort of calm after the worst sectarian violence since last year's Syrian uprising. But with so many dead and injured, feelings are running high. This country is far from united. John Done in Damascus Tributes are being paid to the American D Day veteran and social media star Papa Jake Larson, who died at the age of 102. Larson was among the Allied troops who stormed northern France in 1944 to help end the Second World War. Later in life, he gained a huge social media following, sharing stories of the war and his fallen comrades. Charlotte Simpson has the story. Papa Jake here. Coming UP is the 80th anniversary of D Day. Eighty years ago, I landed on Omaha Beach. Papa Jake Larson delivering one of his many story times to his 1.2 million followers on TikTok. Determined to share the experiences of the greatest generation with the youngest. Born in 1922, Jake Larson lied about his age to enlist in the US National Guard at the age of 15. In January 1942, he was sent overseas and became the operations sergeant tasked with typing up the plans for the invasion of Normandy. Every person that landed on Omaha beach on D Day came through these fingers. These fingers I'm showing you right now. Type their name he too was among those men who stormed the shores of Normandy on June 6, 1944, surviving machine gun fire when he landed on Omaha Beach. Posting on the account she helped set up in 2020, Papa Jake's granddaughter Michaela announced the veteran's peaceful death at the age of 102, signing off the statement with his famous catchphrase, love you all the mostest Charlotte Simpson still to come. It meant an enormous amount, actually, to all of us because we never got to do that back in 1997. We didn't stand on top of the roster and hear the national anthem. The true relay race winners of the World Athletic Championships 28 years ago finally get the gold medals they lost to cheating. We finally switched to T Mobile because they know that those of us here and there want to stay well connected. Let's watch a movie. Thanks to T Mobile, we get Netflix included so we can all enjoy our favorite shows and movies. Now the hard part is getting them to agree on a movie. Switch today and get a Samsung Galaxy S25 plus with Galaxy AI on us plus your plan. Prize is guaranteed for five years. Save today, guarantee for tomorrow. Tap the banner to learn more or visit a store. Guarantees monthly price of contacts and data exclusions like taxes and fee supply. See exclusions and details@t mobile.com Shigeru Ishiba's first year as Japan's Prime Minister has been anything but smooth. He came to power promising to clean up after a major political scandal, but instead lost his party's majority in the lower house and has faced mounting pressure over Japan's rising cost of living. Now, as we record this podcast, if exit polls hold, his Liberal Democratic Party is poised to lose its grip on the upper house as well. But as I heard from our Asia Pacific editor, Celia hatton, the embattled Mr. Ishiba intends to stay on as prime minister. He's facing a fight for his job. He's already said that he doesn't intend to leave his position. Of course, we're waiting for the confirmed election results. But he's also added to the fact that he says Japan is in extremely critical tariff negotiations, dangling the idea that if Japan has a leadership change at this moment, it really could weaken their hand in these very important negotiations with the United States. But going past that moment in time, I think he still is facing a lot of questions about his time at the top, but also the future of Japan's Liberal Democratic Party. You know, they've been in power almost continuously since 1955, but it looks like they're probably going to lose their grip on the upper house in Japan. They've already lost their majority in the lower house. So things really aren't looking very good for the ldp. Although they don't have an obvious rival at the moment. It's a bit of a scrap for other voters among the opposition parties at the moment. Why do people seem to be out of love with the ldp? Quite a few things, really. I mean, first, we've been seeing a lot of voter anger about some fundraising scandals that took place within the LDP and sort of the perception that the LDP really helps its own and doesn't go too far to help ordinary people in Japan. That's been compounded by the fact that Japan's had the same continuous problems for years now. They're facing rising inflation, they're rapidly aging population. They just simply don't have enough taxpayers to support the number of retired people who are really relying on Japan at the moment. The population is shrinking. And so there's an ongoing debate as well in Japan about whether foreign workers should be allowed in to kind of fill some of those crucial positions that Japanese people are just leaving open at the moment. And so there's an ongoing debate around immigration like there is in many other countries. As you say, Mr. Yeshiba has not resigned at the moment, isn't intending to. We haven't got the full results yet. But is he, is he going to be able to cling on? Well, he's already facing calls from within his own party. Some of his rivals are calling on him to step down. So it's really going to be touch and go. If he makes it until after these crucial trade talks that are due to continue next week, maybe he'll be able to continue his grip on power. But Japan's seen a lot of changes in the leadership at the very top in the past few years. So I don't know if voters really have an appetite to go through another leadership change. Maybe they're going to be questioning how long the LDP should stay in power at all. Celia Hatton his escape from prison triggered a state of emergency in Ecuador. His recapture made international headlines in June. Now Ecuador's Ecuador's most notorious drug lord, known as Feto, has been extradited to the United States. His gang, Los Chonoros, is linked to rising drug trafficking and extreme violence that has surged across Ecuador in recent years. Our America's Regional editor Leonardo Rocha told me why this was a relief for the Ecuadorian authorities. He was the biggest drug trafficker in Ecuador. Not only that, the biggest criminal leader. Leader of the Los Choneros, Adolfo Macia is known as Fito. He escaped from prison about two months after the current president, President Noboa, came into power, promising law and order and promising to tackle this lawlessness in Ecuador and rising violence. And in January 24, Feito just escaped from prison in Guayaquil. Was very embarrassing for the government. He took them over a year to arrest this guy. He was arrested a month ago, living in his hometown in basically underground in some luxury. So for the government is a big victory that they can announce. The government also organized a referendum to allow the extradition of Ecuadorian citizens. That was last year. And he is the first one to be extradited to the United States to respond for his crimes there. Yeah. Why has he agreed to be extradited to the U.S. that's very interesting. That's a bit of a mystery because normally when that started with Colombian drug lords of the 1980s, the worst thing for them in Mexico as well was for them to be extradited to the US because when they go there, they have no privileges in prison. They can't control their criminal organization from prison. They had no mobile phones. Basically, nobody's in another country. I think that Fito, the only reason he may have agreed is for some leniency in his sentences. And also he might have feared for his life if he remained in prison in Ecuador. That's the only explanation because he agreed about a week or two ago and he's already flying to the United States. Now, according to the authorities, it is. But Ecuador used to be quite a calm part of Latin America, but not now. 4,000 murders in the first seven months of this year alone. It's. Well, we have success stories and Ecuador is the opposite. I mean, they have oil, they were peaceful. They don't produce any of the drugs. I mean, cocaine or that's the main drug that they don't produce. But it's all produced around them in Peru, in Bolivia and in Colombia, and especially after the pandemic, during the pandemic, they were very badly hit. If you remember, they were the first country where you saw bodies in the streets and all that. And the other cartels, the Mexican cartels, organized crime from the Balkans, Albanians also moved in. And they saw it as a soft spot. The government wasn't prepared. The previous government had also basically expelled the American army. They had a military base there. So they saw Ecuador as a soft spot in a really very convenient location because all those cocaine being produced around now, there's estimates that 70% of the cocaine sent to the US and to Europe go through Ecuadorian ports. And it is really, despite all attempts, it seems very difficult to control violence there, unfortunately. Leonardo Rocha Russia's propaganda war over the conflict in Ukraine is well known, but it also seems to be waging a campaign of indoctrination targeting children in Russian occupied areas of Ukraine with the aim not only to erase Ukrainian national identity, but to turn young Ukrainians against their own country. Vitaly Shevchenko has this report. Children in the occupied Ukrainian city of Mariupol taking an oath of allegiance to Russia. They have been recruited into Yunarmia, the Youth Army, a paramilitary movement linked to the Russian Defense Ministry. Its instructors have been dispatched to Ukraine to teach children to fire weapons, practice military tactics and generally learn how great Russia is. This is one Russian instructor singing in front of Ukrainian children about how victory will be ours and how Russian glory covers the earth. He and the Yunarmia movement are sanctioned by the European Union for indoctrinating Ukrainian children. Full on. Kremlin propaganda is also evident in schools. One Russian textbook portrays Ukraine as a Western invention created to spite Russia and argues that human civilization as we know it might have ended had Russia not invaded Ukraine in 2022. Russian soldiers often come into schools to give so called bravery lessons. In one nursery school, children had to make trench candles and blankets for Russian soldiers. Here's Lisa. She used to go to a Russia run school in occupied Donetsk, but now she lives in the US and she has been blogging about her experiences on TikTok. They were preparing a huge parade of some sort. We had to hold posters. I was told I had to do it to graduate. Every time lessons started, our teacher made us stand up, put a hand on heart and listen to the Russian anthem outside of school. The Kremlin has launched a massive campaign of taking Ukrainian children on tours of Russia to instill pro Russian sentiments. The government in Kyiv says more than 19,000 Ukrainian children have been forcibly deported to Russia, many of them placed with Russian foster parents. Darya Herzemchuk President Volodymyr Zelensky's commissioner for children, says about 1.6 million Ukrainian children remain in areas controlled by Russian forces. If a child refuses to go to school or rebels, you'd be stripped of parental rights and the child will be moved to another family. This threatens our nation's very existence by Killing and abducting children, you deprive a nation of our future. That's what Russia wants. Her Russian counterpart, Maria Lvova Belova, says Russia is only saving Ukrainian children from the war. Ms. Lvova Belova and Vladimir Putin are both wanted by the International Criminal Court at the Hague for allegedly committing the war crime of unlawful deportation of children. Vitaly Shevchenko. 28 years after the race was run, the British 4x400 relay team has been awarded a gold medal. Back in 1997, during the World Athletics Championships in Athens, the British athletes came second to the American quartet, which was later stripped of the title after one of the team, Antonio Pettigrey, admitted to doping. One of those on the podium at the weekend was Roger Black. My colleague Rebecca Kesby spoke to him. It meant an enormous amount, actually, to all of us for lots of reasons, because we never got to do that back in 1997. We didn't stand on top of the roster and hear the national anthem in Athens. But in a funny way, I mean, Yesterday there were 60,000 people in the stadium. There were our friends, our family, our kids who wouldn't have been born when we were doing that. We got to share it with our families, which actually, I have to say, was really, really special. But still. Still wasn't the same as actually, you know, doing it on the night all those years ago. But all of us feel very fortunate that we had that moment yesterday. Yeah. And it was such a tight race, actually, back in 97. I've been it again this morning. And you ran the second leg, which was actually against Antonio Pettigrew. It was, yeah. And he went on to admit that he'd. He'd been doping. And it's quite a tragic story because he ended up dying by suicide a few years later. I mean, what. What are your thoughts on. On that and how, you know, how you got to win in. In the end, if you see what I mean. Yeah. I mean, we made a point to acknowledge that, because myself in particular, I knew Antonio. We were the same generation. He beat me just to win the World championships individually in 1991. Sometimes would warm up and warm down with him for races around the world. He was a nice guy, liked him a lot. But he did go on to admit that he had taken drugs. He was part of an investigation called the BALCO case. You may not know about that in America. Quite a few other American athletes were involved. And, yeah, it was so sad that he took his life. I mean, genuinely, really sad. And I don't know, you know, why. They're not saying why or. But. But yeah, yeah. I mean, obviously it was. It's a sad twist to this story. Athlete Roger Black. And that's all from us for now. But there'll be a new edition of the Global News Podcast later. If you want to comment on this podcast or the topics covered in it, you can send us an email. The address is globalpodcastbc.co.uk you can also find us on X@BBC World Service. Use the hashtag globalnewspod. This edition was mixed by Jack Wilfen and the producers were Alison Davies and Ed Horton. The editor is Karen Martin. I'm Alex Ritz. And until next time, Goodbye. The laws were changing in our country. Women could no longer be discriminated against. It was the dawn of a new era of space flight. NASA started accepting applications from women to be astronauts. That door that had been barred shut for all these years before now actually was hope. It used 13 minutes space presents the Space Shuttle. The inside story of the space shuttle program told by the men and women who made it happen. That was pretty monumental as far as the public was concerned. The first woman astronaut from the United States. You believe in yourself and you think you can do it. Listen now. Search for 13 minutes presents the Space Shuttle. Wherever you get your BBC podcasts and liftoff. Liftoff of STS7 and America's first woman astronaut.