Speaker 1: Hi.
Speaker 2: There.
Speaker 3: Before we get into this episode, a quick update for you.
Speaker 4: A deal was on the table that was virtually identical
Speaker 4: to proposal that Hamas before on me the sixth, A
Speaker 4: deal that the entire world is behind, A deal Israel's accepted,
Speaker 4: and Hamas could have answered with a single word yes.
Speaker 3: Late last night, US Secretary of State Anthony Blincoln appeared
Speaker 3: in front of the cameras with President Joe Biden ceasefire
Speaker 3: proposal teetering on the brink of.
Speaker 4: Collapse based on what we saw last night, the response
Speaker 4: from the Maas numerous changes proposed to the deal that
Speaker 4: was on the table, and that the entire world has
Speaker 4: gotten behind. But some of those are workable changes, some
Speaker 4: as I said, or not. I don't want to characterize
Speaker 4: it further.
Speaker 3: We don't know how far apart Hamas, Israel and the
Speaker 3: United States are, who's agreed to what, or what the
Speaker 3: disagreements are over. We know two things for now, the
Speaker 3: war will continue, and Anthony Blincoln still believes Joe Biden's
Speaker 3: plan to end it can work.
Speaker 4: I believe those gaps are bridgable, doesn't mean they will
Speaker 4: be bridged, because again, it ultimately depends on people saying yes.
Speaker 3: From Schwarz Media. I'm Ashlin McGee. This is seven am.
Speaker 3: There's another proposal for a ceasefire and Gaza, and this
Speaker 3: one seems to be gathering a bit of momentum. It's
Speaker 3: not wildly different to the plans that came before, but
Speaker 3: this one has been backed by the UN Security Council.
Speaker 3: The resolution passed by the Council says Israel has accepted
Speaker 3: the cease fire deal and in a statement, her masters
Speaker 3: welcome the adoption of the resolution. But today it appears
Speaker 3: like a deal might not be reached, with the US
Speaker 3: saying her massays come back with changes that can't be
Speaker 3: accepted today. Senior Foreign affairs reported for the Huffington Post
Speaker 3: us Akba Shahid Ahmad on whether we're any closer to
Speaker 3: a ceasefire. It's Thursday, June thirteenth, Akbar. A few weeks ago,
Speaker 3: US President Joe Biden laid out his planned for a
Speaker 3: ceasefire in Gaza. Right now, that seems to be the
Speaker 3: plan that the international community is getting behind. But the ceasefire,
Speaker 3: of course, hasn't happened yet. Can you explain where this
Speaker 3: proposal came from and what it's up to now?
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely so.
Speaker 5: The Biden administration's current ceasefire proposal is a multi phase plan.
Speaker 5: The idea is you stop fighting for an initial period
Speaker 5: of a few weeks, allows some hostages to be released
Speaker 5: right hostages held by Hamas and allied groups inside KLASA.
Speaker 5: Also allow a lot more aid to get into Gaza,
Speaker 5: so it gets the Palstonian some relief as well. And
Speaker 5: in that period, while there's a temporary halt, negotiate the
Speaker 5: conditions for a more permanent, lasting ceasefire.
Speaker 6: I want to give an update of my effort to
Speaker 6: end the crisis in Gaza.
Speaker 5: This is a proposal that's not entirely new. President Biden
Speaker 5: unveiled it on May thirty first in a speech from
Speaker 5: the White House.
Speaker 6: For the past several months, my negotiators of foreign policy,
Speaker 6: intelligence community like have been relentlessly focused not just on
Speaker 6: a ceasefire that that would inevitably be fragile and temporary,
Speaker 6: but on a durable end of the war. That's been
Speaker 6: the focus of endurable end.
Speaker 5: But actually this was kind of the broad contours of
Speaker 5: the deal that Hamas, the US, Egypt Cut and Israel
Speaker 5: had been talking about a month prior.
Speaker 6: This new proposal has three phases three. The first phase
Speaker 6: would last for six weeks. Here's why it would include
Speaker 6: a full and complete ceasefire.
Speaker 5: What I think is really important is that we've had
Speaker 5: the deal, we've had these contours, we've known these principles
Speaker 5: for this amount of time now, I mean close to
Speaker 5: six weeks, and we haven't been able to make progress.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 5: If anything, that's just been repeated as trits sort of
Speaker 5: been hugely costly within Kasa, killing dozens of civilians. There's
Speaker 5: been some progress on the hostage front. These radis were
Speaker 5: able to have a raid where they released, you know,
Speaker 5: four hostages. We're committed to getting the release of all
Speaker 5: the hostages and we expect haw Mask to release them all,
Speaker 5: but if they don't, will do whatever it takes to
Speaker 5: get them all back home. But actual major progress hasn't happened.
Speaker 5: And from my sources, including people inside the Biden administration,
Speaker 5: the understanding is very much that there's a lack of
Speaker 5: pressure from the US side. Right so the US, as
Speaker 5: the primary diplomatic and military backup for Israel, has that
Speaker 5: kind of leverage over these ratings.
Speaker 2: So the person that.
Speaker 5: The US can bring alongside is is really prime minist
Speaker 5: of Benjamin at Yahoo. But we've seen from the start
Speaker 5: of this war that President Biden has really struggled with that.
Speaker 2: Rhetorically, he's sort.
Speaker 5: Of pushed Prime Minister nat Nyahu to temper his campaign
Speaker 5: to do water shield civilians, to allow and more aid.
Speaker 5: But repeatedly there's been a pattern from the vide administration
Speaker 5: of relying on rhetoric and persuasion rather than actual consequences
Speaker 5: for the Israeli side. And that's kind of the problem
Speaker 5: now with the ceasefire proposal, where they've got the US
Speaker 5: has endorsed it, they've got a lot of other countries,
Speaker 5: the UN Security Council past resolution broadly endorsing it. None
Speaker 5: of that is a way to actually force Israel to
Speaker 5: accept it, right, and so we've seen repeatedly Israeli official
Speaker 5: sy well, this yeald doesn't address our fundamental goal, which
Speaker 5: is not just getting home hostages, but also degrading Hamas
Speaker 5: to a huge degree and also not allowing future harmass
Speaker 5: control and influence inside Gaza in Sport.
Speaker 7: We have gone a long way to return the hostages
Speaker 7: while keeping the wars objectives in mind, primarily the elimination
Speaker 7: of Hamas. We insist that we will achieve both. It's
Speaker 7: all parts of the plan.
Speaker 5: The Biden administration has tried to argue, Oh, this is
Speaker 5: in Israel's own best interest by having this seal, Right,
Speaker 5: given the reputational harm they're facing and the ongoing issue
Speaker 5: of the hostages for Prime Minsat and Yahoo, I don't
Speaker 5: think that's quite clear yet.
Speaker 3: So what's the US playing at here?
Speaker 1: Then?
Speaker 3: And talk to me about how they're framing it, saying
Speaker 3: it's supported by or backed by the Israelis, and then
Speaker 3: they're putting a whole lot of pressure on her mask
Speaker 3: to accept it. So what's this strategy here?
Speaker 5: Yeah, so they've tried to say this was an Israeli
Speaker 5: plan and we as the US, are just kind of
Speaker 5: pushing from behind.
Speaker 4: Look, Israel accepted the proposal as it was, and as
Speaker 4: it is Hamas didn't. So I think it's pretty clear
Speaker 4: what needs to happen, and we're determined in the coming
Speaker 4: days to again try to work this. We will work this.
Speaker 5: That's very hard to do when the Israelis themselves, as
Speaker 5: your friend and ally, are out here saying every single
Speaker 5: day and notice, isn't our plan. We're not going to
Speaker 5: accept this. This doesn't address our concerns for the Biden administration.
Speaker 5: The motivation is it's twofold, right, I mean, it's political. Domestically,
Speaker 5: there's just huge pressure, huge dissatisfaction, particularly among President Biden's
Speaker 5: own Democrats lawmakers, but also just regular voters and citizens,
Speaker 5: I mean who have been demonstrating who don't understand why
Speaker 5: US taxpayer dollars are involved in asteriks that are killing
Speaker 5: children simultaneously. The Biden deministration just doesn't want to be
Speaker 5: talking about this. You know, from a strategic foreign policy
Speaker 5: point of view, you're not going to be able to
Speaker 5: draw international attention, and you're not even going to be
Speaker 5: able to win over the credibility and trust you need
Speaker 5: from other governments to have them sign on to your
Speaker 5: other proposals, which is what the Biden administration desperately wants.
Speaker 3: So you mentioned earlier the rescue of those four hostages
Speaker 3: over the wakend. What's that done to the chances of
Speaker 3: a ceasefire? Has it complicated the chances of getting agreement
Speaker 3: on these deals?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 5: I think it was a really complex moment for the
Speaker 5: US right because as of course true belietion that these hostages,
Speaker 5: one of them, you know, who has a term Neil
Speaker 5: Mother that they were able to be released and brought
Speaker 5: back into Israel, reunited with their families. However, this is
Speaker 5: kind of underscored Prime Minister at Nyaho's commitment to a
Speaker 5: military approach. Now, we haven't seen a military first approach
Speaker 5: to rescuing hostages bring home the vast majority, right, Really,
Speaker 5: it's been less than a dozen and if anything, you've
Speaker 5: actually seen as radio military actions also take out and
Speaker 5: kill a number of hostages tragically. But it does make
Speaker 5: it easier for Prime Minister at Nyaho to challenge the
Speaker 5: Biden administration and say, well, I'm achieving the goals of
Speaker 5: the war. At the same time, publicly they are debating strategy.
Speaker 5: The Biden administration is saying, You're not going to get
Speaker 5: much further in defeating Hamas or bring home your hostages
Speaker 5: with your current approach, and these radio messages essentially ready.
Speaker 2: Make it happen. Trust us.
Speaker 5: And because the Biden administration is unwilling to pull back
Speaker 5: on any of that support, right US intelligence, US support
Speaker 5: is still enabling Israeli ground operations and s strikes. They
Speaker 5: don't really have any more tips to play towards these
Speaker 5: radis other than trying to outsmart them.
Speaker 3: Talk to me a little bit more about that pressure
Speaker 3: that Benjamin NITTNYA who is under and you mentioned they're
Speaker 3: both the internal politics and the external as well. But
Speaker 3: he's got the U S Secretary of State Anthony Blinker
Speaker 3: in town this week. That's going to put a whole
Speaker 3: lot of pressure on him. So talk to me about
Speaker 3: what he's feeling right now.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 5: So for Preme Incidentia who there's a real impetus to
Speaker 5: not be seen as totally adrift from the US. Right
Speaker 5: most is Radi's do see the US as their primary
Speaker 5: defender in a very complex neighborhood, as their longtime ally.
Speaker 5: So and Naho can't come right out and sort of
Speaker 5: give the finger to the Biden administration, much as he
Speaker 5: personally might like to, right.
Speaker 2: I mean, this is the leader.
Speaker 5: Who has been much more supportive of Donald Trump than
Speaker 5: of Democrats over many years. He is medium with Secretary Blincoln.
Speaker 5: He will smile, he'll do the photo op. Though what
Speaker 5: we know is that behind closed doores he's essentially either
Speaker 5: telling the Americans, I just have no interest in doing
Speaker 5: what you want moving towards the ceasefire, or kind of
Speaker 5: telling them one thing and then as soon as Blinker
Speaker 5: or whoever it is he's meeting, leaves doing exactly the opposite.
Speaker 5: Now why does he do exactly the opposite? That gets
Speaker 5: to the question of his internal pressures prement s Natna,
Speaker 5: who depends right now on the most far right government
Speaker 5: in Israeli history. He's brought into power these ministers who
Speaker 5: many other Israeli political parties had for decades seen as
Speaker 5: prisona on grata because of their extremist views on Palestinians
Speaker 5: in particular, but also on a range of issues. Sontnia,
Speaker 5: who knows that that coalition he has is very shaky,
Speaker 5: and because of the leaving an influence he has over
Speaker 5: the far right, he's more likely to lean on these
Speaker 5: kind of more extreme ministers, Ministers who would not support
Speaker 5: us these fire dealga tamas, and who very much want
Speaker 5: to see even if it's strategically unsound, very much want
Speaker 5: to see Israel take these huge STAPs like reoccupying parts
Speaker 5: of Gaza, sustaining security controlled even threatening Israel's decades or
Speaker 5: peace treaty in Egypt. Right, So that's real national security concerns,
Speaker 5: and what these ministers are politically urging that Neoh to do.
Speaker 3: After the break. Why some are describing President Biden's peace
Speaker 3: bid as a hail Mary pass.
Speaker 2: Akba.
Speaker 3: A number of US officials have recently resigned over the
Speaker 3: Biden administration's position on Gaza. Tell me more about what's
Speaker 3: going on for them internally in the pressure that that's
Speaker 3: putting on the US president.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you know, Ashen, in more than a decade of
Speaker 5: covering foreign policy from Washington, I've never seen this degree
Speaker 5: of dissent and frustration among foreign policy professionals, right experts.
Speaker 5: I think the reason for that is there's a real
Speaker 5: sense that national security expertise has been sidelined by the
Speaker 5: Biden administration since October seventh. And that's not a lot
Speaker 5: of people who have been working on these issues for
Speaker 5: years to quit, starting with someone called Josh Paul I
Speaker 5: was the first to reveal his resignation in October.
Speaker 8: Well, I've actually heard since I left from so many
Speaker 8: scores of people, not only from within the State Department,
Speaker 8: but from across the US government, including them.
Speaker 5: And this was someone who was an arms dealer essentially
Speaker 5: for the US government, right, I mean, overseeing weapons transfers
Speaker 5: to some really questionable regimes like Saudi Arabia.
Speaker 2: Even he felt.
Speaker 5: Look, at least internally before we were having a debate over.
Speaker 2: These weapons transfers.
Speaker 5: Following October seventh, we've been quite silenced and stifled.
Speaker 8: All saying that they are finding what is being done
Speaker 8: incredibly difficult to support, incredibly difficult to comprehend, and yet
Speaker 8: of being met with silence or with being told that
Speaker 8: they should stop questioning the policy and just move ahead.
Speaker 5: Now.
Speaker 2: That happened back in October.
Speaker 5: After that, we didn't see a resignation at a high
Speaker 5: level until January. And now just in this calendar year
Speaker 5: we're sitting here in June, we've seen, in fact, close
Speaker 5: to ten more. You've seen people resign from non foreign
Speaker 5: policy related departments such Parton of Education, Department of Interior.
Speaker 5: One of them was the first Jewish American appointed to resign.
Speaker 5: She sat up and said, look, President Biden, someone I
Speaker 5: signed up to work for, is in fact making chows
Speaker 5: in America less safe.
Speaker 2: I don't want to be part.
Speaker 1: Of this, and that not only is it devastating for Palestinians, right,
Speaker 1: but I think October seventh made it very very clear
Speaker 1: that it also doesn't keep Israeli safe, and that if
Speaker 1: we wanted to actually create a thriving future for Israelis,
Speaker 1: for Palestinians, for Jews, for the communities that we care
Speaker 1: about here in America. Something has to change.
Speaker 5: You've seen someone who was AURB Americans stand up and say,
Speaker 5: I don't want to feel implicated in the massive death
Speaker 5: of people from my community.
Speaker 2: It wasn't a particular moment in time.
Speaker 5: I think it was a culmination of near daily dehumanization
Speaker 5: of posting and lives in Gaza in the West Bay.
Speaker 5: And then you've seen a number of national security experts,
Speaker 5: so people from the military, two more people from the
Speaker 5: State Department.
Speaker 8: Stacy Gilbert served as senior Advisor in the State Department's
Speaker 8: Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration, which is the State
Speaker 8: Department's chief humanitarian office.
Speaker 5: And in fact, this is this last official Stacey Gilbert
Speaker 5: is someone who's been doing that work for more than
Speaker 5: twenty years. She quit over a specific report, right she
Speaker 5: quit over the support Divide administration produced last month, which
Speaker 5: was supposed to be just a factual analysis of allegations
Speaker 5: of Israel breaking in national law using US equipment.
Speaker 9: I was shocked, however, that it also went on to
Speaker 9: say that Israel it is our assessment that Israel is
Speaker 9: not blocking him ouanetarian assistance. That is not that is
Speaker 9: not the view of subject matter experts at the State Department,
Speaker 9: at USAID, nor among the humanitarian community.
Speaker 10: And that was No, You're not an administration or a
Speaker 10: department that twists the facts and allegations that we have
Speaker 10: are unfounded. But this is as any report and as
Speaker 10: any process that is undertaken in a policy making process.
Speaker 10: These processes are deliberative and they involve inputs from people
Speaker 10: at a variety of seniority and expert levels.
Speaker 3: What are people who are still inside the administration telling
Speaker 3: you at the moment?
Speaker 2: I think the ongoing offensive and rough is extremely.
Speaker 5: Concerning to a lot of people because more than a
Speaker 5: million Parastenians have now fled over the past month since
Speaker 5: Israel launches operation and importantly, this was precisely the operation
Speaker 5: present Biden had that he could not support. So I
Speaker 5: think there was a lot of hope. Look, these are
Speaker 5: people who have signed out to join government right. They
Speaker 5: are fundamentally institutionalists. They believe that the system works. And
Speaker 5: when a leader like President Biden says I have a
Speaker 5: red line on RUFFA, I will not give these Raeli's
Speaker 5: military assistants to go into this final refuge for Palestinians.
Speaker 5: They believe him right, and they really take that seriously.
Speaker 5: I think the repeated sort of collapse and emptiness of
Speaker 5: promises like that around the report around the Rough Offensive
Speaker 5: have deeply disillusioned people. I wouldn't be surprised if there
Speaker 5: were more resignations. It's important to remember there there could
Speaker 5: be many. We just don't know about where people haven't
Speaker 5: come out publicly and said it.
Speaker 2: But I do hear that.
Speaker 5: As a Rough Offensive grinds on as these kind of
Speaker 5: huge strikes killing dozens of children become more common, and
Speaker 5: famine is under way in Gaza as people die of
Speaker 5: preventable reasons. Right aid can get through famine support and
Speaker 5: get through it just isn't that's pushing more people towards
Speaker 5: that breaking point at the State Department, intelligence community, in
Speaker 5: the military, and other related agencies.
Speaker 3: Akbar, Finally, what do you think will force the next
Speaker 3: move here? When will we see some movement and some
Speaker 3: practical steps towards pace.
Speaker 5: I think there's a few factists look at that's political
Speaker 5: pressure for President Biden. He has a presidential debate with
Speaker 5: Donald Trump coming up at the end of June, and
Speaker 5: I think he knows that cars will be a big
Speaker 5: is shoot there. He'll want something he can talk about
Speaker 5: positively at that moment. If his seats fire proposal doesn't
Speaker 5: go through, if he can't get these released their greet it,
Speaker 5: I think you'll see some scrambling by the campaign and
Speaker 5: the deminstration to get some other truncated version of a
Speaker 5: halt in fighting.
Speaker 2: I think something one insider.
Speaker 5: Described to me earlier this week was with the seats
Speaker 5: fire proposal, President Biden did what we call a hail
Speaker 5: Mary pass right.
Speaker 2: I mean he.
Speaker 5: Realised, I'm just going to put it all out there
Speaker 5: called is an Israeli thing and try to create pressure
Speaker 5: on them. Ten days in these Radis have resisted the pressure.
Speaker 5: It's a stand off. Now it's the game of chicken.
Speaker 5: But they will have to try another move from the
Speaker 5: Biden administration side, and that could take the form of
Speaker 5: circumventing these Raadis. There's been some talk about a direct
Speaker 5: American Hamas deal on at least some of the hostages.
Speaker 5: I also think, just finally, as we see risks of
Speaker 5: other wars increase, also in southern Lebanon and northern Israel.
Speaker 5: That could affect the administration's thinking. If that happens, that's
Speaker 5: extremely scary for President Biden in terms of wider war,
Speaker 5: bringing in around, bringing in the US, and I think
Speaker 5: you could see different behavior from him.
Speaker 3: Then, Abar, thanks so much for your time. It's been
Speaker 3: great to chat.
Speaker 2: Thanks for having me. Ashlyn.
Speaker 3: Also in the news today, the Premiere of Victoria has
Speaker 3: issued a statement in support of the young women and
Speaker 3: parents at a Victorian school after the arrest of a
Speaker 3: teen who allegedly created explicit deep fake images of fifty
Speaker 3: female students. In a statement, Premier just Cinra Allen said, quote,
Speaker 3: there's no place for this disgraceful and misogynistic conduct in Victoria.
Speaker 3: And despite the cost of living crisis, executives at top
Speaker 3: Australian companies are receiving generous pay rises. According to a
Speaker 3: report from the Governance Institute of Australia. It found CEO
Speaker 3: salaries at their top two hundred ASX listed companies rose
Speaker 3: by fourteen percent in the last financial year, from an
Speaker 3: average of one point one four million dollars to one
Speaker 3: point three seven million per year. That's all from the
Speaker 3: team at seven am for today. My name's Ashlin McGee.
Speaker 3: Thanks for your company. I'll see you again tomorrow