WEBVTT - Did Israel or  Hamas win this war?  

0:00:05.040 --> 0:00:07.920
<v Speaker 1>From The Australian. Here's what's on the front. I'm Claire Harvey.

0:00:08.000 --> 0:00:14.120
<v Speaker 1>It's Tuesday, January twenty one. The second Trump Era has

0:00:14.120 --> 0:00:17.560
<v Speaker 1>officially begun, with the Donald officially sworn in at the

0:00:17.640 --> 0:00:22.560
<v Speaker 1>Capitol in Washington, DC overnight. Donald Trump is the oldest

0:00:22.600 --> 0:00:24.760
<v Speaker 1>person ever to be elected to the White House at

0:00:24.800 --> 0:00:27.840
<v Speaker 1>seventy eight, and he's now both the forty fifth and

0:00:28.120 --> 0:00:32.479
<v Speaker 1>forty seventh president of the United States. To watch video

0:00:32.520 --> 0:00:35.120
<v Speaker 1>of the inauguration and to read all about what Trump

0:00:35.159 --> 0:00:38.440
<v Speaker 1>two point zero means for Australia and the world, go

0:00:38.479 --> 0:00:44.400
<v Speaker 1>to the Australian dot com dot au. Now, all hell

0:00:44.479 --> 0:00:48.160
<v Speaker 1>will break loose if the hostages aren't freed by inauguration day.

0:00:48.600 --> 0:00:52.360
<v Speaker 1>That was Donald Trump's rather opaque threat, and it seems

0:00:52.400 --> 0:00:56.240
<v Speaker 1>to have worked. Hamas has begun returning civilian hostages. It

0:00:56.320 --> 0:01:00.080
<v Speaker 1>took on October seven, twenty twenty three, in stage one

0:01:00.080 --> 0:01:05.319
<v Speaker 1>of a ceasefire hammered out by international negotiators, including representatives

0:01:05.319 --> 0:01:10.160
<v Speaker 1>of Joe Biden and Donald Trump. Israel has opened its

0:01:10.200 --> 0:01:14.560
<v Speaker 1>prison gates to release Palestinian inmates. That's Israel's end of

0:01:14.560 --> 0:01:18.319
<v Speaker 1>the deal. So what's the price Israel will pay for

0:01:18.360 --> 0:01:22.360
<v Speaker 1>this peace and can we say who was won this war?

0:01:34.280 --> 0:01:37.920
<v Speaker 1>Cameron Stewart is the Australian's chief international correspondent, and Cam,

0:01:38.040 --> 0:01:42.240
<v Speaker 1>as we're speaking on Monday, Israel is releasing prisoners from

0:01:42.360 --> 0:01:43.120
<v Speaker 1>its prisons.

0:01:43.520 --> 0:01:48.160
<v Speaker 2>Ninety Palestinian prisoners are being transferred out of Israeli jails.

0:01:48.600 --> 0:01:51.840
<v Speaker 2>It begins one of the largest prisoner and hostage deals

0:01:51.840 --> 0:01:55.320
<v Speaker 2>in modern history. The three women were taken to Israeli

0:01:55.320 --> 0:01:59.080
<v Speaker 2>soldiers just inside the border, waiting for each of them

0:01:59.400 --> 0:02:01.800
<v Speaker 2>their mothers.

0:02:03.040 --> 0:02:07.640
<v Speaker 1>Israel holds thousands of Palestinian people who it accuses or

0:02:07.680 --> 0:02:10.639
<v Speaker 1>has convicted of crimes over the years, including some people

0:02:10.639 --> 0:02:14.959
<v Speaker 1>who they have brought back from Gaza during this recent war.

0:02:15.440 --> 0:02:17.720
<v Speaker 1>What do we know about the people who are being

0:02:17.760 --> 0:02:19.720
<v Speaker 1>released from Israeli prisons right now?

0:02:20.600 --> 0:02:23.280
<v Speaker 3>The people who have been released from Israeli prisons have

0:02:23.320 --> 0:02:26.920
<v Speaker 3>been the subject of intense negotiation for months now, and

0:02:27.040 --> 0:02:29.560
<v Speaker 3>the first ones to be released they'll be about nineteen

0:02:29.680 --> 0:02:32.520
<v Speaker 3>hundred overall under the deal. If the three stages of

0:02:32.520 --> 0:02:36.359
<v Speaker 3>this ceasefire agreement are completed, about nineteen hundred will come out,

0:02:36.360 --> 0:02:39.040
<v Speaker 3>but at the moment ninety have come out. These are

0:02:39.120 --> 0:02:43.000
<v Speaker 3>almost all women and children. And then progressively, they will

0:02:43.040 --> 0:02:45.919
<v Speaker 3>go to more serious offenders who will be released up

0:02:45.919 --> 0:02:49.160
<v Speaker 3>to an including several who have been accused of and

0:02:49.320 --> 0:02:52.240
<v Speaker 3>convicted of killing Israeli's in terror attacks.

0:02:53.800 --> 0:02:56.400
<v Speaker 1>It would seem kind of shocking for some of our

0:02:56.440 --> 0:02:59.840
<v Speaker 1>listeners to think that Israeli is holding quite young people.

0:03:00.120 --> 0:03:03.280
<v Speaker 1>Many of the prisoners are under the age of twenty, Say, Cam,

0:03:03.560 --> 0:03:05.919
<v Speaker 1>what do we know about who the people are who

0:03:06.120 --> 0:03:07.280
<v Speaker 1>Israel detains.

0:03:08.639 --> 0:03:11.000
<v Speaker 3>I think the original ones who are going to be

0:03:11.040 --> 0:03:14.119
<v Speaker 3>released clear are relatively lower level of offenders. As you say,

0:03:14.200 --> 0:03:17.480
<v Speaker 3>I mean these often are teenagers who are hurling rocks

0:03:17.480 --> 0:03:20.079
<v Speaker 3>at Israeli soldiers on the West Bank for example. They

0:03:20.080 --> 0:03:23.600
<v Speaker 3>are often detained if they repeat. Defenders often get incarcerated

0:03:23.680 --> 0:03:26.440
<v Speaker 3>women as well, and so they're the sort of group

0:03:26.520 --> 0:03:29.120
<v Speaker 3>of people of prisoners who are of course very easy

0:03:29.160 --> 0:03:32.240
<v Speaker 3>for Israel to release. As far as the political swap goes,

0:03:32.280 --> 0:03:34.760
<v Speaker 3>it gets much harder for Israel obviously once you go

0:03:34.800 --> 0:03:37.120
<v Speaker 3>down the track and you get to very hard bitten

0:03:37.120 --> 0:03:39.000
<v Speaker 3>offenders have actually murdered Israelis.

0:03:40.680 --> 0:03:43.040
<v Speaker 1>This goes to one of the big questions I think

0:03:43.040 --> 0:03:46.280
<v Speaker 1>as we think about this war, Cam, what's the price

0:03:46.320 --> 0:03:50.640
<v Speaker 1>of peace? How much has Israel had to compromise to

0:03:51.280 --> 0:03:54.600
<v Speaker 1>end the fighting for Benjamin Ettnya who to get the

0:03:54.600 --> 0:03:57.760
<v Speaker 1>hostages home for those families who've been demanding that he

0:03:57.880 --> 0:03:58.160
<v Speaker 1>do so.

0:03:58.920 --> 0:04:02.840
<v Speaker 3>Yes, I mean nineteen hndred Palestinian prisoners for approximately one

0:04:02.920 --> 0:04:05.640
<v Speaker 3>hundred hostages, of which only about sixty I believed to

0:04:05.640 --> 0:04:07.520
<v Speaker 3>be alive, is of course seen by many as a

0:04:07.600 --> 0:04:09.360
<v Speaker 3>very uneven swap. But look, I think this is the

0:04:09.400 --> 0:04:12.080
<v Speaker 3>price that Israel had to pay to get these Israeli

0:04:12.240 --> 0:04:15.960
<v Speaker 3>hostages released. Hamas would not accept a lower price than that.

0:04:16.080 --> 0:04:18.719
<v Speaker 3>I think Benjamin Ettnia, who is in a position now

0:04:18.760 --> 0:04:23.440
<v Speaker 3>having really dismantled Hamas as a viable, large militant force,

0:04:23.920 --> 0:04:26.200
<v Speaker 3>he really was under enormous pressure to try and get

0:04:26.200 --> 0:04:29.240
<v Speaker 3>a hostage deal together because there's no way that Israel

0:04:29.360 --> 0:04:32.080
<v Speaker 3>and then this war without those hostages coming out. So

0:04:32.400 --> 0:04:35.080
<v Speaker 3>this was something which I think that Benjamin Natier, who,

0:04:35.320 --> 0:04:38.359
<v Speaker 3>especially with the incoming president Donald Trump, the pressure that

0:04:38.360 --> 0:04:41.240
<v Speaker 3>he applied, I think Netnio who thought that the time

0:04:41.320 --> 0:04:42.760
<v Speaker 3>was right now to make this deal.

0:04:47.440 --> 0:04:50.320
<v Speaker 1>Let's talk about the Trump factor. Cam He famously said

0:04:50.360 --> 0:04:53.440
<v Speaker 1>that if the hostages weren't released by January twenty, the

0:04:53.520 --> 0:04:56.880
<v Speaker 1>day that he was inaugurated that all hell would break

0:04:56.920 --> 0:05:02.080
<v Speaker 1>loose in the Middle East.

0:05:00.320 --> 0:05:02.840
<v Speaker 4>If those hostages aren't back. I don't want to hurt

0:05:02.880 --> 0:05:06.479
<v Speaker 4>your negotiation. If they're not back by the time I

0:05:06.560 --> 0:05:09.680
<v Speaker 4>get into office, all hell will break out in the

0:05:09.680 --> 0:05:12.719
<v Speaker 4>Middle East scale and it will not be good for Hamas,

0:05:13.320 --> 0:05:15.239
<v Speaker 4>and it will not be good frankly for anyone.

0:05:15.320 --> 0:05:16.440
<v Speaker 3>All hell will break out.

0:05:17.120 --> 0:05:19.320
<v Speaker 1>We never really learned what all hell was going to

0:05:19.360 --> 0:05:22.240
<v Speaker 1>look like. What do you think the Trump factor was?

0:05:22.760 --> 0:05:25.000
<v Speaker 3>I think the Trump factor was from har Massa's point

0:05:25.000 --> 0:05:28.159
<v Speaker 3>of view, they certainly didn't want America to become more

0:05:28.160 --> 0:05:31.760
<v Speaker 3>involved in their eradication. Now exactly what format would have

0:05:31.880 --> 0:05:34.560
<v Speaker 3>taken is very hard to know because clearly the Americans

0:05:34.600 --> 0:05:36.760
<v Speaker 3>we're never going to put troops into Gaza, but it

0:05:36.800 --> 0:05:39.799
<v Speaker 3>certainly would have added to HARMSSUS calculations. I think from Netania,

0:05:39.839 --> 0:05:42.040
<v Speaker 3>Who's point of view, though clear he knew that the

0:05:42.080 --> 0:05:44.760
<v Speaker 3>timing of this cease fire, if he agreed to it,

0:05:44.800 --> 0:05:46.920
<v Speaker 3>would be a credit to Trump. Trump would get a

0:05:46.960 --> 0:05:48.840
<v Speaker 3>fair bit of credit for it, which he has. In fact,

0:05:48.839 --> 0:05:50.520
<v Speaker 3>one of the mothers of one of the hostages who's

0:05:50.600 --> 0:05:54.400
<v Speaker 3>released has thanked Donald Trump precisely, and so I think Netanya,

0:05:54.440 --> 0:05:56.680
<v Speaker 3>who he wants to have a good relationship with the

0:05:56.720 --> 0:05:59.560
<v Speaker 3>incoming president. It's very important to him and for Israel

0:06:00.080 --> 0:06:01.320
<v Speaker 3>on the track, and I think that would have been

0:06:01.360 --> 0:06:03.440
<v Speaker 3>a fact that in his own political calculation as to

0:06:03.520 --> 0:06:04.400
<v Speaker 3>the timing of this.

0:06:08.200 --> 0:06:11.200
<v Speaker 1>Coming up. How does Israel win back a generation of

0:06:11.279 --> 0:06:22.039
<v Speaker 1>young people who believe it has committed war crimes. When

0:06:22.040 --> 0:06:24.480
<v Speaker 1>you look at the history of Israel since its creation

0:06:24.760 --> 0:06:27.440
<v Speaker 1>after the Second World War came, it's a series of

0:06:27.480 --> 0:06:32.360
<v Speaker 1>wars Israel invaded by its Arab neighbors or Israel taking

0:06:32.400 --> 0:06:37.599
<v Speaker 1>aggressive action against them.

0:06:38.040 --> 0:06:40.320
<v Speaker 5>The first and to father was sparked by the deaths

0:06:40.320 --> 0:06:44.919
<v Speaker 5>of four Palestinians in December nineteen eighty seven. By the

0:06:44.920 --> 0:06:47.640
<v Speaker 5>time it ended in nineteen ninety three, more than one

0:06:47.680 --> 0:06:49.440
<v Speaker 5>thy one hundred people had died.

0:06:50.040 --> 0:06:54.000
<v Speaker 4>In the course of six frantic days, Israel decimated the

0:06:54.160 --> 0:06:58.200
<v Speaker 4>armies and air forces of Egypt, Jordan and Syria and

0:06:58.320 --> 0:07:00.000
<v Speaker 4>redrew the map of the Middle East.

0:07:00.120 --> 0:07:04.039
<v Speaker 3>Jaza today's firing of a rocket from Gaza towards Israel

0:07:04.200 --> 0:07:06.800
<v Speaker 3>is a serious and unacceptable violation.

0:07:07.080 --> 0:07:10.560
<v Speaker 1>Another news, Israel has come under intense international criticism over

0:07:10.680 --> 0:07:13.920
<v Speaker 1>what Palestinians have called the biggest land grab by the

0:07:14.000 --> 0:07:18.800
<v Speaker 1>state in three decades, when we look back at the

0:07:18.960 --> 0:07:22.600
<v Speaker 1>war that began after October seven, what do you think

0:07:22.640 --> 0:07:24.040
<v Speaker 1>we'll think did Israel win?

0:07:25.840 --> 0:07:28.360
<v Speaker 3>Now? It depends how we characterize the win. I think

0:07:28.560 --> 0:07:31.200
<v Speaker 3>this is a very different skirmish and conflict. I think

0:07:31.280 --> 0:07:34.680
<v Speaker 3>to a lot of previous ones, this is a seismic event,

0:07:35.080 --> 0:07:37.080
<v Speaker 3>the conflict that has happened in the last fifteen months

0:07:37.160 --> 0:07:40.960
<v Speaker 3>after the massacre of October seven. I think that what

0:07:41.000 --> 0:07:44.800
<v Speaker 3>we have seen here is Israel emerging from this conflict

0:07:44.880 --> 0:07:47.600
<v Speaker 3>as the dominant strategic player in the Middle East in

0:07:47.600 --> 0:07:50.560
<v Speaker 3>a way that we've never seen before. What's happened from

0:07:50.600 --> 0:07:55.120
<v Speaker 3>Hamasa's miscalculation of massacring Israeli's has been the crushing of

0:07:55.120 --> 0:07:58.720
<v Speaker 3>Hamasa's a viable militant force. But I think strategically, more

0:07:58.760 --> 0:08:02.920
<v Speaker 3>significantly for Israel, it led Hezbollah to support Hamas in

0:08:02.960 --> 0:08:07.080
<v Speaker 3>a fatal miscalculation that, as we have seen, has led

0:08:07.120 --> 0:08:10.920
<v Speaker 3>Israel to literally crush Hesbella as a viable military force

0:08:11.320 --> 0:08:15.880
<v Speaker 3>in Lebanon, one of Iran's key terror proxies. Iran itself

0:08:15.920 --> 0:08:18.920
<v Speaker 3>has been humbled. It attacked Israel twice as a result

0:08:19.000 --> 0:08:22.239
<v Speaker 3>of this conflict and got beaten up twice as a result,

0:08:22.640 --> 0:08:26.640
<v Speaker 3>and so really Iran emerges from this as a strategically

0:08:26.680 --> 0:08:30.679
<v Speaker 3>weakened player in the Middle East. That is Israel's greatest enemy,

0:08:30.920 --> 0:08:34.080
<v Speaker 3>only the Yemen who the rebels are firing missiles at

0:08:34.120 --> 0:08:37.080
<v Speaker 3>Israel at the moment, and that's only spasmodic. In other words,

0:08:37.160 --> 0:08:40.600
<v Speaker 3>Israel has really tamed its borders, and we've had the

0:08:40.600 --> 0:08:43.120
<v Speaker 3>fall of the Syrian regime as well, where Israel has

0:08:43.160 --> 0:08:46.760
<v Speaker 3>gone and destroyed military equipment just to prevent any future

0:08:47.080 --> 0:08:50.959
<v Speaker 3>threat arising from Syria. So I think Israel has emerged

0:08:50.960 --> 0:08:53.840
<v Speaker 3>from this as the strategic leader in the Middle East

0:08:53.840 --> 0:08:55.680
<v Speaker 3>in the way that no one would have imagined just

0:08:55.720 --> 0:08:56.600
<v Speaker 3>fifteen months ago.

0:08:57.840 --> 0:09:01.040
<v Speaker 1>One of the things that Hamas's leader Aa Sinoa and

0:09:01.200 --> 0:09:04.120
<v Speaker 1>the organization wanted to achieve on October seven was the

0:09:04.160 --> 0:09:10.120
<v Speaker 1>mobilization of international opinion to make Israel react and to

0:09:10.160 --> 0:09:14.200
<v Speaker 1>incite revulsion in the West with the inevitable pictures of

0:09:14.760 --> 0:09:19.080
<v Speaker 1>death and destruction in Gaza. They've definitely succeeded in that,

0:09:19.120 --> 0:09:19.720
<v Speaker 1>haven't they came?

0:09:20.240 --> 0:09:23.320
<v Speaker 3>Look, that's true. The greatest loss to Israel from this

0:09:23.400 --> 0:09:26.680
<v Speaker 3>conflict has been its international reputation in the way that

0:09:26.720 --> 0:09:29.440
<v Speaker 3>it's fought. The war in Gaza widely seen as been

0:09:29.640 --> 0:09:32.280
<v Speaker 3>too heavy handed, a terrible severne death told by any

0:09:32.320 --> 0:09:37.080
<v Speaker 3>calculations upwards of forty thousand, and Israel will take a

0:09:37.080 --> 0:09:40.640
<v Speaker 3>lot to get that international reputation restored. However, I think

0:09:40.679 --> 0:09:42.840
<v Speaker 3>from Israel's point of view, that really hasn't been a

0:09:42.840 --> 0:09:45.160
<v Speaker 3>priority at all. Of you read the media and look

0:09:45.160 --> 0:09:47.839
<v Speaker 3>at the debate there in Israel, Claire, it's really been

0:09:47.880 --> 0:09:50.280
<v Speaker 3>a matter of survival for the Israelis. They just wanted

0:09:50.320 --> 0:09:52.800
<v Speaker 3>to ensure that they are in a position never to

0:09:52.840 --> 0:09:55.120
<v Speaker 3>be attacked again like they were in October seven. I

0:09:55.200 --> 0:09:57.920
<v Speaker 3>think the international reputation side of it has come a

0:09:57.960 --> 0:10:01.960
<v Speaker 3>distant second in Israel to actually winning the conflict and

0:10:02.000 --> 0:10:04.400
<v Speaker 3>protecting and their citizens from future attacks.

0:10:05.400 --> 0:10:08.760
<v Speaker 1>And so what now, How does Israel handle a generation

0:10:08.880 --> 0:10:11.480
<v Speaker 1>of people who are maybe now at university or now

0:10:11.480 --> 0:10:14.400
<v Speaker 1>in their twenties. They are the diplomats and the prime

0:10:14.400 --> 0:10:18.880
<v Speaker 1>ministers and the presidents of the future. They've been exposed

0:10:18.920 --> 0:10:22.680
<v Speaker 1>to the Middle East conflict, often in a very partisan way,

0:10:22.720 --> 0:10:26.040
<v Speaker 1>and many of them would be sympathetic to the Palestinian side.

0:10:26.280 --> 0:10:30.120
<v Speaker 1>Now can how does Israel win those people back to

0:10:30.559 --> 0:10:32.280
<v Speaker 1>understanding why Israel exists.

0:10:32.920 --> 0:10:36.439
<v Speaker 3>It's going to be a long term generational battle for

0:10:36.559 --> 0:10:39.160
<v Speaker 3>Israel who win back the hearts and minds of those people,

0:10:39.200 --> 0:10:42.719
<v Speaker 3>I think. I think it's interesting Israel was criticized far

0:10:42.800 --> 0:10:45.400
<v Speaker 3>too prematurely in this conflict. I think a lot of

0:10:45.440 --> 0:10:49.040
<v Speaker 3>the people you're talking about, sort of liberal left academics especially,

0:10:49.360 --> 0:10:52.160
<v Speaker 3>had a hostile view to Israel well before October seven,

0:10:52.320 --> 0:10:55.880
<v Speaker 3>saw it very much as a colonizer, a hostile power,

0:10:55.920 --> 0:10:58.600
<v Speaker 3>aggressive power in the region. You know, they didn't take

0:10:58.640 --> 0:11:00.920
<v Speaker 3>into account any other fact as such, of the fact

0:11:00.920 --> 0:11:03.559
<v Speaker 3>that Israel has been repeatedly attacked since it was created.

0:11:03.800 --> 0:11:07.920
<v Speaker 3>It's the only democracy amidst of Islamic dictatorships in the

0:11:07.920 --> 0:11:11.400
<v Speaker 3>Middle East. It has values that Western academics would like,

0:11:11.520 --> 0:11:14.440
<v Speaker 3>such as equality for women, a whole lot of issues

0:11:14.440 --> 0:11:17.760
<v Speaker 3>that they would identify with, and yet Israel has played

0:11:18.040 --> 0:11:20.640
<v Speaker 3>to be the bad boy really from day one, even

0:11:20.679 --> 0:11:24.440
<v Speaker 3>in Australia with the Opera House protests, even before Israel

0:11:24.520 --> 0:11:27.120
<v Speaker 3>had retaliated for October seven.

0:11:26.480 --> 0:11:29.720
<v Speaker 1>Anti Semitic slurs chanted and an Israeli flag set on

0:11:29.840 --> 0:11:33.400
<v Speaker 1>fire during that illegal pro Palestinian rally last night.

0:11:33.440 --> 0:11:36.600
<v Speaker 3>I think you saw this reflex of anti Israeli and

0:11:36.800 --> 0:11:42.440
<v Speaker 3>unfortunately bleeding into anti Semitic behavior in universities around the world.

0:11:42.520 --> 0:11:45.520
<v Speaker 3>And I think so Israel started in a position of disadvantage.

0:11:45.720 --> 0:11:47.560
<v Speaker 3>And I think that obviously, as the war has gone

0:11:47.600 --> 0:11:50.560
<v Speaker 3>on in Gaza and the criticism of its conduct of

0:11:50.600 --> 0:11:53.800
<v Speaker 3>that war has increased, that has made that position even

0:11:53.840 --> 0:11:55.560
<v Speaker 3>more difficult for Israel. So I think we're looking at

0:11:55.600 --> 0:11:58.480
<v Speaker 3>a generational challenge for Israel to win back the hearts

0:11:58.480 --> 0:12:00.800
<v Speaker 3>and minds of some of those people. I'm very doubtful

0:12:00.920 --> 0:12:02.640
<v Speaker 3>that they even had it to begin with.

0:12:04.440 --> 0:12:10.800
<v Speaker 1>Cameron Stewart is The Australian's chief international correspondent. You can

0:12:10.840 --> 0:12:14.040
<v Speaker 1>read Cam's analysis of both the Israel situation and the

0:12:14.080 --> 0:12:17.520
<v Speaker 1>Trump inauguration. He's a busy guy right now at the

0:12:17.600 --> 0:12:19.520
<v Speaker 1>Australian dot com dot au