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UN Security Council calls emergency meeting on Gaza
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UN Security Council calls an emergency meeting following Israel's plan for Gaza City
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Valerie Sanderson
This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the uk. You're not at your house, you're at a lavish seaside estate. You're not walking the dog, you're hunting for clues in an Agatha Christie mystery. See it differently with BritBox Stream an endlessly entertaining collection of British TV, including new original series Ludwig, starring David Mitchell. Bit awkward really. I think I might just have solved a murder and Outrageous A scandalous true story. Seems there's a political extremist in every family these days. See it differently when you stream the best of British TV with BritBox. This is the global News podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Valerie Sanderson and in the early hours of Saturday 9th August, these are our main stories. The UN Security Council has called an emergency meeting on Sunday in response to Israel's plan to take control of Gaza City. Armenia and Azerbaijan have signed a peace deal at the White House which aims to end decades. President Trump says both sides have vowed to stop fighting each other forever. As India prepares to face punitive U.S. tariffs, the leaders of India and Russia reaffirm their country's special relationship. Also in this podcast, the NASA astronaut Jim Lovell, who guided the famous Apollo 13 spacecraft safely back to earth after an explosion on, has died at the age of 97. The UN Security Council is to hold an emergency meeting on Sunday to discuss the Israeli government's decision to expand its war against Hamas and to take control of Gaza City, where a million Palestinians live. The decision to meet follows widespread condemnation of the plan. The UN Secretary General's chief spokesman described Israel's proposal as a dangerous escalation. The head head of the European Council, Antonio Costa, said such a move must have consequences for EU Israeli ties. While Saudi Arabia says it categorically condemns Israel's plan and Turkey has called for global pressure to stop it. Senior members of the Israeli military say the proposal is unworkable, while the families of the hostages believe it would put the lives of captives in even more danger. Yatam Wilk is a former Israel Defense Forces combat officer who served in Gaza and until last October. We're now near 400 Israeli soldiers who are willing to speak out publicly, which we all know how difficult that is during the state of war, during this complicated state of war to publicly speak out and be critical towards the actions pushed through by the Israeli government and its policy in Gaza. I do think the majority of the people in Israel understand that we cannot trust anymore the Israeli government. We couldn't trust them on the 7th of October and we cannot trust them Now. But these people at a market in Jerusalem said Mr. Netanyahu was right to continue the assault on Gaza. What's the alternative? What should they do instead? Have we tried making deals? Yes. It's not doing anything. Has there still been attacks? Yes. Has there still been casualties on both sides? Yes. So it needs to be finished. That's it. We need to finish now. All the terror. If the name is Hamas now, we must be fine. Not need. We must now. In Gaza City, there was fear about yet another displacement. This woman said her family would stay. We have evacuated almost 10 times. We won't evacuate. We will stay in our places. No matter what happens, we won't evacuate because when we did, it was torture. Analysts say taking control of Gaza City is likely to be the first phase of a full takeover of the entire territory. Our correspondent in Jerusalem, Eme Nada, reports what's left of Gaza City. Half of Gaza's Palestinians live here. Many displaced from elsewhere throughout the war. Now by land, all 1 million here will be forced out, pushed south by Israel's military. Prime Minister Netanyahu's plan is a significant step towards every last corner of the Gaza Strip coming under Israeli control. A total military occupation. In order to assure our security, remove Hamas there, enable the population to be free of Gaza and to pass it to civilian governance that is not Hamas and not anyone advocating the destruction of Israel. In Israel, there's been a strong reaction where the majority of Israelis want the war to end. Opposition leaders and hostage families are calling it a death sentence for the 50 Israelis who remain in captivity in Gaza. To 20 of whom are believed to still be alive. You failed. My Matan is still there. Instead of doing the one thing that this government hasn't done, putting a comprehensive deal on the table that will bring all 50 of them home together. The concerns of the hostage families are shared by Israel's military leadership. In a dispute that erupted into public, the army's chief of staff reportedly telling Mr. Netanyahu that taking over Gaza City will be a trap for the army and endanger the hostages. Prime Minister Netanyahu's plan also further isolates Israel internationally, including among some of its allies here, the UK's Prime Minister, Keir Starmer, calling the decision wrong, that it will only bring more bloodshed. Now, after 22 months of war, Gaza's civilians once again face a new wave of displacement and death and the vanishing prospect of a ceasefire deal that could ease their suffering. Netanyahu's decision to occupy Gaza. There's nothing left to occupy. We're already dying 100,000 deaths every day. Practically all of Gaza has been squeezed into the western part of Gaza City. At this point, for the people, there's no difference anymore whether he occupies it or not. Israel has today once again widened the horizons of its war in Gaza with a move that could have untold ramifications for Palestinians and hostages. Emma Nada the UN Security Council's decision to hold a meeting on Sunday follows widespread condemnation of Mr. Netanyahu. Germany has suspended the export of weapons that could be used in Gaza. Israel's plans for the territory were also discussed when the US Vice President J.D. vance met the British Foreign Minister, David Lammy at his official residence in southern England. As our World News correspondent Jo Inwood reports, the British government has been clear in its condemnation of the move, a point reiterated by Mr. Lammy. I am concerned about what is developing in Gaza at this time and the recent decision by the Cabinet. He may have been toning down his criticism because of the man sitting next to him. The US is Israel's most staunch supporter and Vice President Vance in the UK for a family holiday, steered away from criticizing the escalation of the war. We want to make it so that Hamas cannot attack innocent Israeli civilians ever again. And we think that has to come through the eradication of Hamas. Second, the President has been very moved by these terrible images of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza. So we want to make sure that we solve that problem. I think all of us can work on how to solve that problem. Obviously it's not an easy problem to solve or it would have already been dealt with. Other traditional allies have been less equivocal. Germany has always stood full square behind Israel, in no small part because of a sense of historic responsibility. It has also been a leading exporter of weapons, providing about a third of imports. But because of the escalation of operations in Gaza, Chancellor Friedrich Merz has said that exports of any arms that could be used there would be banned. Exactly what that involves is not yet clear. But Germany mainly provides naval equipment, including frigates and torpedoes, as well as armored trucks, anti tank weapons and ammunition. It's just one example of Israel's growing international isolation. China, Australia, Turkey, Finland, to name a few, have all criticised Benjamin Netanyahu's plans, something welcomed by the Palestinian Ambassador to the un, Riyad Mansour. We are grateful for the positions declared by a number of countries, including the European Union, uk, the position of Germany, which indicated that they will not send weapons to Israel that could be used against the Gaza Strip. What we need is Peace. What we need is the end of occupation and the independence of the state of Palestine and to make the global consensus on the two state solution a reality. But that feels as far away as ever. Even as the world calls for a ceasefire, Israel's government seems set on escalation. Joe Inwood, our chief international correspondent Lee Doucet gave us this analysis. The plan was agreed by the Security Cabinet and it came after by all accounts, an incredibly heated meeting which went long into the night. It lasted 10 hours. They're being described as shouting matches between the army chief of staff, Eyal Zamir, who only months ago Prime Minister Netanyahu had not just picked but praised as he was given the job of top commander. He was vociferous in his opposition to Prime Minister Netanyahu's plan, which is why the plan which emerged, which we, as you've been reporting, talks about a takeover of Gaza City is different from what Prime Minister Netanyahu spoke about in an interview which aired just before the Security Cabinet on Fox TV where he talked about taking over the Gaza Strip, at least for a short time. So I think, Valeria, it's being widely seen that the so called takeover of Gaza City, which will last months it seems is only the beginning and that Prime Minister Netanyahu has not given up on his ambition to control the Gaza Strip, which is very much in line with the thinking of his far right wing ministers. So that's the end game to control the entire thing. Prime Minister Netanyahu throughout this 22 months of war has not hidden that he in fact he has boasted about spending a career preventing the establishment of a Palestinian state. And the only post war plan that he has latched onto is the one that President Trump raised, kind of mused about but hasn't talked about since, which is this idea of property development, a Middle east riviera. And Prime Minister Netanyahu saw in that a way out for him, that the way tofor him, the way to resolve this problem is to simply, as they put it, volunt for the Palestinians to choose to leave and in the eyes of the far right wing ministers to repopulate Gaza with Jewish settlers. So the US Backs this plan. Do you think President Trump has gone back and forth Right now he seems, as we've just heard from J.D. vance, his focus is on the hunger in Gaza. And American media said there was another shouting match, this time between Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Trump who pushed back when Prime Minister Netanyahu said there's no starvation in Gaza, to which according to These reports, President Trump said, I've seen the pictures and you cannot make it up. But he was asked a few times in recent days about the plans in Gaza, and he said it's up to Israel to do what Israel thinks best. Lys Doucet the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan have signed a peace deal at the White House aimed at ending the decades long conflict between the two countries. Speaking at the signing ceremony, President Trump said both sides had committed to stop all fighting forever. For more than 35 years, Armenia and Azerbaijan have fought a bitter conflict that resulted in tremendous suffering for both nations. They suffered gravely for so many years. Many tried to find a resolution, including the European Union. The Russians worked very hard on it never happened. With this accord, we've finally succeeded in making peace. Azerbaijan's President Ilamaliyev called it an historic day, while the Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said the agreement paved the way for a new era. I heard more from our Caucuses correspondent, Rehan Dimitri a short time after the documents were signed. We haven't seen the text of the declaration that was signed. It was announced that the three leaders signed a joint declaration on Trump's route for International Peace and Prosperity summit. So it was not the actual peace treaty. What we've seen in the White House are very cheerful leaders, lots of congratulations, lots of smiles and statements from the Azerbaijani leader. He said that a significant milestone has been achieved. They were talking about the Nobel Peace Prize and how Armenia and Azerbaijan together will send a letter to the Nobel Prize committee to nominate President Trump. They also signed though, didn't they, bilateral trade deals with the United States? Yes, that's been announced by President Trump. But I think what's key in today's achievement is that Trump's route for international Peace and prosperity, this is a strategic road which will connect Azerbaijan to its exclave of Nakhichivan and that will run past southern Armenia along the border with Iran. And this is something that Azerbaijan wanted all along because it wants direct access to Turkey. So connecting to its exclave of Nakhichivan will give Azerbaijan access to Turkey and it will also end Armenia's isolation, because throughout the past four decades, as long as this conflict over Nagorno Karabakh between the two countries lasted, Armenia has been isolated. Two of its borders with Azerbaijan and Turkey were shut. So it is a major and significant achievement, even if it's not the actual peace deal. We know that both countries agreed on a draft text of the peace deal back in March, but there were a lot of points of contention that they couldn't resolve. Now, judging by all smiles and congratulatory tones, it is definitely a major milestone. Reyhan Dmitry. After the signing ceremony, reporters asked Mr. Trump when he expected to see the Russian President, Vladimir Putin to discuss ending the war in Ukraine. Mr. Trump declined to say at the time, but later announced on social media that it would be on Friday of next week in the US State of Alaska. Here's Tyler Dunn. The meeting, which has been trailed for months, was finally confirmed tonight by Mr. Trump on social media. He wrote, the highly anticipated meeting between myself as President of the United States of America and President Vladimir Putin of Russia will take place next Friday in the great state of Alaska. Further details to follow. Thank you for your attention to this matter. There'd been rumors that the encounter would take place in Italy or Hungary. It is, however, US Territory, which simplifies security concerns. It also positions Trump as the host to his Russian counterpart on land that the US Purchased from Russia more than a century and a half ago. Earlier in the White House, Mr. Trump hinted that a deal to end the fighting was taking shape. You're looking at territory that's been fought over for three and a half years with, you know, a lot of Russians have died, a lot of Ukrainians have died. So we're looking at that, but we're actually looking to get some back and some swapping. It's complicated. It's actually nothing easy. It's very complicated. Donald Trump, who promised last year that he would quickly end the war in Ukraine if he returned to the White House, must be hoping that next week's meeting in Alaska will finally yield the progress he was hoping for. Tyler Dan India's Prime Minister, Narendra Modi has spoken to Vladimir Putin amid rising tensions over US tariffs. Mr. Modi described the phone call as good and detailed, saying they'd reaffirmed their commitment to deepen their special relationship. Alice Martin reports. US tariffs on India were doubled to 50% to increase pressure on the government to cut purchases of Russian oil. The US Says buying oil helps Russia's war in Ukraine. The new rates are due to start on the 27th of August. Faced with this deadline, India is preparing to host a US Team for trade talks. Previous negotiations stalled over agriculture and dairy, both sectors where the US Demands greater access. But India is holding firm, particularly when it comes to genetically modified food imports. Alice Martin the NASA astronaut Jim Lovell has died at the age of 97. In 1970, he commanded the Apollo 13 mission to the moon, which was aborted two days into the flight when an oxygen tank exploded on the spacecraft. Jim Lovell famously led the mission safely back to Earth. In a statement, his family said they were proud of his leadership in pioneering spaceflight. NASA praised Jim Lovell's role in shaping future missions, calling him a symbol of courage and, and of optimism. Our science correspondent Palab Ghosh looks back at his life. Jim Lovell was one of America's earliest astronauts, training for his first space flight in 1965 in NASA's Gemini program to develop the Apollo rockets that would take astronauts to the lunar surface. In 1968, he and his crew became the first people to reach the moon. All systems are dope. Apollo 8, it did not land, but their views of Earth from space showed it as a beautiful, fragile planet, one world in stark contrast to the global conflicts and social tensions on the ground. On Christmas Eve, he and his fellow astronauts read from the book of Genesis. And God called the light day, and the darkness he called night. And the evening and the morning were the first day. 1 0. We have commit and we have liftoff at 2:13. Two years later, he was on his way back to the moon. This time the mission was due to land. But then. This is Houston, say again please. We heard a sharp bang. The spacecraft vibrated back and forth and then everything was quiet. One of the spacecraft's oxygen tanks exploded. The crew were trapped in a spacecraft low on power and water. Lovell was in command. We are venting something out into the space. We were some 200,000 miles from Earth, some 90 hours to get home, and we were going in the wrong direction. People across the world followed their fate. We figured we've got about 15 minutes worth of power left in the command module, so we want you to, to start getting over in the lamin, getting some power on that. The crew had to move to the lunar lander to stay alive. Kept their cool while engineers at mission Control plotted a new course for the spacecraft that would bring it home. Now, looking towards an alternate mission, one of the news broadcasters gave us a 10% chance. My wife happened to hear about it. She was kind of just, you know, worried about it. I really wouldn't want him to make another flight, but I don't really know what he's going to do. It's up to him. You would not want him to make another flight? Well, after this, I don't think I would. No. Mrs. Lovell got her way and this was his last mission. We tried to figure out, you know, what happened. If I had just waited for some miracle, I'd still be up there. The best thing we can do now is just to listen and hope. And then came the most dangerous part of the mission. Re entry into the Earth's atmosphere. There they are. There they are. They've made it. It was one of NASA's finest moments, led by one of its most experienced and heroic astronauts, Pahlav Ghosh on Jim Lovell, who's died at the age of 97. Still to come, the dilemma facing the French. We are losing our faith in mineral water. The only solution is to cut the volumes we consume and move to something more significant, sustainable. Travis fell in love with the perfect woman. She listened, she cared. There was just one catch. She wasn't human. She was an AI companion. But when her behavior takes a disturbing turn, Travis finds himself at the center of a much darker story. This is Flesh and Code, a true story of love, loss and the temptations of technology. Listen to Flesh and Code wherever you get your podcasts. Brazil's president, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has vetoed parts of a new law that aims to simplify the environmental licensing process for projects such as new roads and mines. Critics have long argued that the bill could speed up deforestation, naming it the Devastation Bill. Here's our South America correspondent, Ione Wells. This bill is meant to essentially overhaul environmental licensing rules in Brazil at the moment. Big new infrastructure projects, things like mines or energy infrastructure. Roads need environmental licenses to show that they won't do significant harm to the environment. And this can sometimes take years, involve a lot of different agencies, public consultations, and this bill aimed to streamline that. Some of the measures that Congress had improved approved included things like allowing some smaller projects to self declare their own environmental impact or have their licenses automatically renewed. This is something that concerned a lot of the critics of the bill. There was also plans to implement deadlines for agencies to approve projects and if they didn't approve a project within a specific time period, it could be approved automatically. Also, there is a measure in the bill which essentially gives the government the power to fast track licenses for some projects if they're considered strategic for the government. So was this intervention by President Lula, was that a surprise? Well, I think a lot of people thought that he would veto elements of this bill. He has vetoed some sections of it and he's drafting a new bill essentially to bring back to Congress for them to then look at again. In particular, he has vetoed some of those measures around things like kind of allowing some projects to self declare. However, he has signed a measure immediately granting approval for that special license that I mentioned, which would allow a fast track license for projects that the government considers strategic. So this will be implemented now, immediately. There are big concerns about this from groups like Greenpeace because they argue that this measure could be used to fast track strategic projects that President Lula has supported, like potentially oil drilling in the Amazon basin or other sort of big oil projects, for example, in areas that are considered sensitive hotspots for biodiversity. So he has approved that measure, but as I say, other measures he has vetoed. This will mean that this will now go back to Congress. There is a chance that we're going to see quite a back and forth now over this because the conservative leaning Congress may well try to reinsert some of the measures that he has vetoed. So we could expect some battles to come, both politically and potentially even legally down the road here. Ione wells for many animals, including us, once an eye is lost, that's it. Vision goes and you won't get it back. But there's one animal which apparently can regrow a functioning eye, and that's a particular type of snail, the gold, an apple snail. The freshwater species and its remarkable ability is the subject of a study in the journal Nature Communications. Tim Frank spoke to the lead author, Alice Okorsi, assistant professor of molecular biology at the University of California at Davis in the United States. It's known that snails are really good at regenerating in general. Like this is something that is known for a very long time. There are like descriptions that said there are snails that are able to regenerate also their full head. So we know that molluscan snails are really good at regenerating, but on these specific species and this animal, it was a little bit of a guess. So I tried and it worked well. So amazingly, they can regenerate their eyes. At what point did you work out that, I mean, not only had they regenerated an eye, but that the eye was functioning for now, we did a lot of work. We still don't have a behavior that is like really telling us what they can see, but everything, if we look at the anatomy and the gene expression in the regenerated eye, everything is very, very similar to the intact one. So our best guess is that probably is fully regenerated. We are trying to understand which genes or which elements that are regulating genes important for eye regeneration in apple's nails and everything that we do, we keep comparing what we find in apple snails with what is known in mouse and what is known in human to try to see if Snails came up with this magic recipe or maybe they are just using common elements in a different way. And so I'm expecting to have many years of work ahead of me and our team. But yes, understanding genetically how these snails can generator is our main goal now. Alice Corsi from the University of California Private security guards in South Africa have been enlisted to protect the body of the former Zambian president Edgar Lunku. As the Lusaka government and the family disagree over where he should be buried, there have been several attempts to remove the body without family authorization from the morgue in Pretoria. As Nomsa Maseko reports, the bad blood goes Back to when Mr. Lungu was in power and the current Zambian president Hakainde Hichilema was in opposition and was once accused of treason. The Lusaka government says the former president belongs to the people of Zambia and so must be buried in his homeland. But the family wants a private funeral in South Africa. A South African court has now sided with the government, but this row may not be over. As the family has said it will appeal. Nomsa Maseko, a Chinese billionaire who vanished more than two years ago, has been freed from detention. As yet, the authorities in China haven't given an explanation as to why Bao Fan, a banker, had been imprisoned. Our Asia Pacific editor Mickey Bristow told us more. Bao Fan, a billionaire banker, started his own Investment bank in 2005. Previously he'd worked for many Western banks, educated abroad, really connected to the Communist Party in China. This investment bank did a lot of deals in particularly in tech and he was really a star performer, one of the most high profile business people in China. Then a couple of years ago he suddenly disappeared. Nobody knew where he was. A statement from his bank said that he'd taken time off to spend time with his family and because of health issues. But that came a year after he disappeared. Been no explanation from the authorities about what's happened to him, no explanation from his from the bank which he founded. And so we're all everyone has just been left to assume that he's been detained. I think that's exactly what's happened now he's been released, although we still haven't had official word of that. We've just heard that he's been released. So he's been freed. What's happened to him, do we know? No. He was freed apparently earlier on this week. There have been a number of reports. The first one came from a Chinese financial news outlet who have connections, other news outlets, Reuters, Bloomberg are reporting it as well. He supposedly, as I said, released earlier on this week, don't know where he is, whether or not he's facing charges, where he's been, what his rule will be in the future, whether he'll go back to the banks, all of these things remain unknown. The Chinese government hasn't given any explanation at all, ever, about what it did with him and why it did that. What does this tell us about China, do you think? Well, certainly if you were a business person in China, if you were a high profile business person, you would have been worried by the fact that somebody as wealthy, as successful, as high profile as this could suddenly go missing. And it's not just the first person. Another famous businessman, Jack Ma, who founded Alibaba, the online trading platform a couple of years ago, he went missing as well. I think what it tells you about China is that essentially anybody can disappear at any time if you ang the wrong official. Mickey Bristow French mineral water companies, big international brands like Perrier, Evian and Vichy are increasingly worried about global warming. Recently, an official French government report found that more than a third of producers have secretly been using methods like microfiltration to treat their water. Campaigners say because of climate change, companies are less certain than they used to be about the purity of what they sell. Huskofld has been to Verges in the south of France, where they make perhaps the most emblematic of all French mineral waters, Perrier. Up here on the hill. We have before us now this vast panorama stretching down to Verges. This is Perrier country. And what strikes you straight away is that this is not some kind of alpine yvel where the mineral water comes from, but the hot south of France. The flat plain, densely inhabited, heavily farmed. We've come to Verges, the historic home of Perrier, because Perrier and its owner, Nestle, are at the center of this debate over mineral water quality. What many experts are saying is that changing weather patterns, successions of drought and flash flooding are having an impact not just on the regular water table, what people use for tap water, but also now on the deeper levels from where the companies pump the mineral water that they sell in bottles. Basically, they say contaminants are getting into these lower aquifers too. Stefan Mondar covers the story for Le Monde newspaper. A few years ago, you could protect the water, the resource, because there was enough water. But with the climate crisis, there is every time less water, less reserve, and there is no dilution of the contamination in the water and illegal systems of treatment. It's now been established were put in place. At a hearing before a Senate committee in Paris, the CEO of Nestle in Laurent Freckles admitted that just like many other companies did, Perrier had used Ultra Fine microfilters to screen its water. This was wrong because under EU law, natural mineral water is not meant to be treated at all. The committee chairman is Laurent Berguis. The cheating was to hide the microfiltration. When inspectors came, they couldn't see it. So the product that was sold was called natural mineral water. But what people were really drinking was not that natural at all. Nestle's CEO also revealed that a recent government hydrologist report into the site here at Verges gave a negative assessment, putting at risk Perrier's right to call itself natural mineral water. This is being appealed against by Perrier, whose own hydrology geologist, Jeremy Pralong insists the water the company extracts from 130 meters down is pure and unchanged. I'm 100% convinced because the purity at source is there because the wells have a very stable mineralization. It's really the water from Pere Ah. Bottled mineral waters have been a huge commercial success story for France. But increasingly there are voices saying that the existing model cannot be sustained. It's not just the depleting resource and the risk of contamination. It's also the 15 billion plastic bottles that are sold every year. Hydrologist Emma Aziza because of a whole series of factors, we are losing our faith, faith in mineral water and it's not going to get better anytime soon. The only solution is to cut the volumes we consume and move to something more sustainable. Back in the ultra modern Perrier factory in Verges, the focus is now on a new brand, Maison Perrier energy and flavoured drinks that are proving highly popular. The big advantage is that these drinks do not not need to qualify as natural mineral water. They can be treated and filtered. Hugh Schofield in the south of France. And that's it from us for now. But there will be a new edition of the global News podcast later. If you want to comment on this podcast or the topics covered in it, send us an email. The address is globalpodcastbc co.uk. you can also find us on Echo@BBC World Service. Use the hashtag global newspod. This edition was mixed by Rezenwyn Doral. The producers were Liam McSheffrey and Peter Hyatt. The editor is Karen Martin. I'm Valerie Sanderson. Until next time. Bye bye.