Latest / explore words discover worlds / In Conversation with Husam Zomlot and Humza Yousuf | Bradford Literature Festival 2026

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In Conversation with Husam Zomlot and Humza Yousuf | Bradford Literature Festival 2026 · explore words discover worlds

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_03: Good evening! Good evening, good evening, Bradford.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_03: It's wonderful to be anew.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_03: My first time ever in Bradford.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_03: So thank you so much for the hospitality.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_03: Um, thank you to my dear friend, uh dear brother Ambassador Hussam Zomlot.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_03: And ladies and gentlemen, Alul Hussam, I believe, has been to Bradford before.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_03: This is the first time he is coming as Ambassador Hussam.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_03: Which I was going to say deserves a round of applause, but you beat me uh to it.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_03: Um, just before we uh arrived, and I hope they won't mind me sharing the story, uh, there was a brief gathering of a few of us brought together by my dearest friend, the MP for Bradford West, uh Nasha.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_03: If you haven't bought her book Honoured, you must buy it.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_03: Um with her, and with us was another ambassador, Ambassador Ibrahim Rousseau.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_03: And uh as the two of them met, and we're going to go into the story, um Hussam was rather upset because he said I was the only ambassador that got kicked out of the United States.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_03: And now Ibrahim, who got kicked out in 2025 by the Trump administration, both of you have been kicked out by Donald Trump.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_03: And I got a photo with both these men, which means my chances of getting to the United States is absolutely screwed.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_03: So, anyway, putting that to the side, let's get stuck right in because we have a very hard stop.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_03: Um, I don't think he needs much of an introduction, but Ambassador Hussam Saeed Zumla, born on the 31st of August 1973, is a Palestinian ambassador, diplomat, academic, and economist, appointed head of the Palestinian mission to the United Kingdom in 2018, which then got, of course, upgraded to an embassy this year.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_03: He has served as the um before that uh his posting was to the United States as the PLO head of mission, and that was closed by the Donald Trump administration, which we will talk about.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_03: Uh he's a senior member of FATA, the main Palestinian political movement, a strategic advisor to Mahmoud Abbas.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_03: Before entering politics, uh Ambassador Zomlot was a professor of public policy at Burzik University and has a distinguished uh academic uh career as well.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_03: I want to get stuck straight in, if you don't mind, uh Ambassador.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_03: But before we get stuck into the politics, because everybody knows Hussan from the incredibly powerful media appearances he's made, I think, especially since October the 7th, 2023.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_03: In my opinion, uh, I think he's been the most powerful Palestinian voice globally and has challenged a lot of the mainstream narrative uh that we've seen take place since October the 7th.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_03: But before we get to Hussam the diplomat, before we get to Hussam the politician with a small P, let me understand a little bit more about Hussam the person.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_03: You see, uh Hussam was born and started his life in Shaburah refugee camp in Gaza.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_03: I suspect, possibly the only person in this room that was born and grew up in a refugee camp.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_03: So tell us a little bit about your family's life.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_03: Um 1948, where the family was before the Nakbah.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_03: And before you do that, I'm just going to tell the audience here to spot, give you a little spoiler.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_03: My wife, her family is also from Vaza.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_03: But before 1948, they were from a small village called Julis, which doesn't exist anymore.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_03: It was wiped off the map by the Israelis.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_03: And I believe that's only a few kilometers from where your family are from.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_03: So with that, Hosan, please tell me a little bit about where the family came from and what life was like growing up in a refugee camp.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_04: Thank you very, very much, uh Hamza, my friend and brother, and I'm so proud to call you a very dear uh friend, and it's an honor uh that you are interrogating me today.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_04: Um I have to tell you uh I am more terrified to be interrogated by you than Pierce Morgan and the law, you know, with such friends who need enemies.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_04: But uh Hamza, this is an opportunity to say that during the most difficult time facing the Palestinian people, you were there defending the Scottish people and defending your family in Gaza.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_04: You are a voice, uh a passionate voice.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_04: You have really helped push through the narrative that has transformed the public opinion of this country, and we will always remember your leadership and your contribution as a First Minister of Scotland and later on.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_04: I can't wait to read your book, Under Fire, and I really cannot wait to read it.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_04: But documenting from your own family perspective what has taken place in Palestine in Gaza is something that we very much appreciate.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_04: And please line up for buying Hamza's book.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you for the plug.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, yes.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_03: Right, please, family.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_04: Before family, also I'd like to really thank the Bradford Literature Festival for making this such uh a flagship event every year, for making Bradford our home every year this time, for making us come and be among our family every year.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_04: Thank you, Simon and the team, and of course, the one and only here today, Naz Shah, for always hosting us and making sure we meet all the members of the brilliant community here.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_04: It does feel like family.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_04: And bet I bet you and I, next year, Hamza and I will come back to Bradford to the festival to meet all of you.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_04: Um and answering your question, uh my friend, uh I grew up in the Shabura refugee camp.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_04: That's a refugee camp in Rafah.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_04: Um my family comes from a small, beautiful, very peaceful uh village by the name of Simsem.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_04: Sim means sesame, but I come from a family that are primarily farmers.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_04: So we my my parents, grandparents used to own land, farm their land.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_04: So is the entire village.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_04: And the village next to us, which is your wife's village, Julis.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, that was uh a farming uh area.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_04: Um in 1948, my grandfather and father um uh uh were forced out of Simpson.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_04: And by the way, my mother is also from the same original village.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_04: Like Julis, Simpson was completely leveled, and in fact, they turned it into some sort of a forest, so they make sure that we will not be able to trace back where our homes are.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_04: Anyway, as a result, I was born in a refugee camp in almost like a tent with some blue flags flying because of the UN.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_04: So we were educated by Honorwa, provided healthcare by Honorwa, etc.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_04: Um, my experience with the camp is as a child you don't know what's beyond the boundaries of the camp.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_04: So the camp for me was the best life there is, and I was so spoiled.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, we were provided with so much love because of the collective experience of being ethnically cleansed, because of a nation that has gone through such a trauma during the 1948 events.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_04: I was the maybe the first or the second generation of the Nakba, the son of the Nakba.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_04: They tried their best to compensate us by giving us so much love.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_04: I always say that one uh one mother is enough to be in control of her children, but in the camp, you almost have 20 mothers.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_04: I literally have 20 mothers.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_04: Everyone is your mother, and everyone is your uncle, and everyone is your brother.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_04: It's the definition of communal life.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_04: And they the community, that sense of community, do so much to give you protection, to give you love, to give you to invest in you.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_04: So I tell you, if you ask me, would I want to be born anywhere else?
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_04: No, I want to be born again in that refugee camp because it brings you up as a human being, as a man that belongs to a great community, a great nation, and brings you up in such deep romance with your people, which is important.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_03: That's fascinating.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_03: And your description of a son of the Nakbah.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_03: When does Hussam Zumlot really begin to understand what his parents and grandparents have gone through?
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_04: Interestingly, they didn't tell us much.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_04: They brought their culture, their traditions, everything.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_04: They called quarters of the camp according to the original village.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_04: So next to us were Barca, there is Jules.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_04: So all the people who came from the villages named their neighborhoods according to the original village to maintain, maintain the memory, the collective experience.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_04: But they never really, when I when we were children growing up, they never offloaded on us what has happened to them.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_04: In a way, I think they wanted to protect us, they wanted to avoid hatred or resentment.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_04: But as you grow up, I remember I was maybe seven years old, six, seven years old when I first I was hit with the situation because my grandfather, with my father, uh uh uh in the refugee camps came and said, Hossam, come in the car.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_04: They had a fiat car, light green.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_04: I don't know why they chose that color.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_04: As a child, the most exciting thing at the time was to, you know, jump in a car.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_04: So I did.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_04: And the journey took like 40 minutes, and I was wondering, where are we going?
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_04: Until we got to this empty land, lots of trees.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_04: At the time it was just beginning, you know, it would they had just planted it a few years before.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_04: And then my grandfather started telling me and searching for his home.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_04: And it was very difficult for him to find his home until he found a fig tree.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_04: And he told me, I planted that tree.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_04: This is my home, these are the stones of our home, this is where our entrance, that was the backyard and the terrace.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_04: And he could have painted for us as if as if he was looking at his home.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_04: He walked in with me when I was behind him, as I'm a child, and he repeated that a couple of times later, as if mentally he was literally opening a door.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_04: He would turn right.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_04: There was nothing.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_04: Unbelievable, his memory of his home that got destroyed.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_04: So as you are brought up, you are shielded from the collective experience.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_04: But down the line, they start bringing you up, giving it to you slowly, slowly.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_04: And when I was there the first time, a child, and I was telling my grandfather, You have all this land?
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_04: He said, Yes.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_04: I said, Your home was that big?
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_04: He said, Yes.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_04: I said, Why the hell are we living in a refugee camp?
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_04: It took us, it took us 40 minutes to get to your home.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_04: I don't want to go back to the refugee camp, I told him.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_04: Let's stay here.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_04: It's so beautiful.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_04: And you know I can run the fields.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_04: But then my grandfather, I remember him looking at me with that almost tearing eye, not able to tell me that we dare come back to our own home.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_04: Despite the fact how close it is.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_04: But then at that point in my in my in my in my life, I began to ask serious questions.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_03: Slowly.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_03: Fascinating.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_03: Fascinating.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_03: Um so then young Hussam grows up.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_03: You're probably in your late teens, maybe even early 20s, first intifada that takes place.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_03: So I wonder if you tell me is is that the moment that young Hussam begins to get interested in politics?
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_03: Uh and who are your heroes growing up?
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_04: Yes, that was the point, exactly.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_04: That was December 1987.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_04: I must have been 12 or 13 years old then.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_04: Um and I remember vividly, as if it is today, uh, the beginning of the First Antifada, because it started in Gaza, in Jabalia, to be very precise.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_04: In the north.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_04: Jabalia is again a big refugee camp in the north of Gaza.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_04: Rafah is Shabura is a big refugee camp in the south of Gaza.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_04: And because of it's a refugee camp, because it of the experience of the Nakba, usually struggle, nationalism, national movements begin in camps.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_04: Remember Janine?
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_04: You know the Tulkarim camps.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_04: So refugee camp, they bring the Palestinian identity to the fore.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_04: Um, but nonetheless, yes, I remember sitting in our classroom, again, an honorable school.
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_04: I must have been in, you know, uh what they what we call their second elementary, whatever it is.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_04: Year eight or something here or nine.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_04: Uh and then all of a sudden, tear gas is in the school.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_04: The the teachers are telling us, you have to leave, you have to leave.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_04: Rubber bullets all over.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_04: We were children, literally.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_04: And um, you know, all the school went out, and I went with them, with my colleagues, uh, with my classmates.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_04: There were hundreds of us.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_04: And then we all went towards a protest, and we joined naturally without even thinking or taking a decision, because we were part of that community.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_04: It's it was our elder brothers, it was our neighbors, it was our parents.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_04: We took part in that.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_04: I was one of the unlucky ones because of my height.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_04: I was one of the tallest.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_04: So I I demonstrated like everybody else, and the only weapon that was used during that time by the Palestinians is throwing a small little rock that will not really harm all these armored Israeli soldiers.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_04: But I was unlucky because they chased me and chased me and chased me until I got back to my uh refugee camp and I thought, okay, this is my neighborhood, I know the streets, they will never catch me.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_04: And you know, as a child, I was able to really evade and maneuver and all that, and I got into one of the homes next to us.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_04: One of them was as tall as me, so they spotted me.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_04: A whole little fight happened between the entire camp, my mothers, the 20 mothers, and the soldiers who were besieging the house for two hours.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_04: And then they got into the house, they arrested me, beating and all that.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_04: But at that moment, I came to a close reality of the whole thing.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_04: That there is ugly occupation, there is oppression, there is military uh uh presence that is not welcomed in our surroundings.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_04: At that moment, the first antifada, it was the first day of the first antifada, actually, I came to realize that uh what would I want to be is part of my national movement.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_03: Wonderful.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_03: So you were a troublemaker from a young age, which is because we like troublemakers.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_04: No, I was unlucky and told.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_04: Unlucky at the time.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_04: But they beat but they beat it the hell out of me then.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_03: Because we are we are for the audience.
• 15:51
  SPEAKER_03: I want you to begin to think uh 15 minutes, so around quarter two, we're gonna come to you for for questions in the audience.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_03: So begin to ferment those.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_03: But before we get there, I'm gonna keep going through um understanding uh some of the key pivotal moments.
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_03: So let's fast forward.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_03: That's your political, that's the moment the penny drops, you begin to become politically interested.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_03: Um you join Fatah, uh well you uh uh you join Fatah before your academic journey or during your academic your time as a student at Bursai?
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_03: I was I joined Fatah practically at the age of 14.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, okay, well, incredible.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_03: So you join Fatah, you get involved in your academic journey, you obviously excel, people see in the Palestinian uh the PLO, they see that you have extraordinary talent, many global postings, but let's fast forward, I think, given the time, to the United States.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_03: So 2017, you get appointed as the Palestinian envoy to the United States.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_03: You take over from mine, uh, Erikat.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_03: But not long after your posting, President Trump in his first term orders the closing of the Palestinian mission, and he cites lack of progress towards a peace deal, and I think simultaneously, also, of course, in a very provocative move, moves the US Embassy to Jerusalem, of course, which is occupied.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_03: Um tell me what it was like living through that.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_03: Was there a phone call?
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_03: Did you know President Trump was about to close the Palestinian mission?
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_03: Did you hear it and read it off the press?
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_03: Did you have back channels to the Trump administration?
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_03: What was it like as the person who was living through the Trump first Trump presidency at the time that he closed down the Palestinian mission in the United States?
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_04: Well, first of all, I want to echo what you started by saying that uh my claim to fame up until recently was I was the first and the last ambassador to be kicked out by Trump.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_04: But then Ambassador Ibrahim Rasul really destroyed that claim to fame to me.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_04: You know, but I must say on behalf of Ambassador Ibrahim Rasul and on behalf of the beloved country he represents, that is South Africa, that number one, I was kicked out of the US for representing my people and my country and my cause, and he was kicked out of the US for representing my people and my country and my country.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_04: And I know you paid the price for standing tall for the Palestinian people, and you still do as South African, uh, my brother Ibrahim, uh, all the way to being firm uh with the International Court of Justice, taking Israel to court for the crime of genocide.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_04: We know the pressure South Africa is under, but South Africa can never, never, ever give in, Habibis.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_04: So thank you.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_04: As for Trump, maybe uh Ambassador Rassour will tell you about it.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_03: No, no, don't try to pass the question on.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_03: What was it like living through the street?
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_04: It was extremely and utterly uh uh uh uh unexpected.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_04: Uh how did you find out?
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_04: A phone call came to me from the senior official of the State Department at the time, the head of the Middle East and North Africa uh department, they call it Near Easter.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_04: Um he called and he said, Are you alone?
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_04: I said, Yeah.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_04: He said, Are you standing?
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_04: I said, What where does this go?
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_04: I said, come on, man.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_04: I come from a Shabura refugee camp.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, what?
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_04: Don't tell me uh he said, Well, uh I just want to tell you the the mission, the Palestinian mission, is to be closed.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_04: I thought he's talking about closing it for a national holiday or something.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_04: I said, when?
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_04: He said, no, no, no, it will be permanently closed.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_04: Now, only a few days before that, we were busy arranging summits between our president and the US presidents.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_04: I had arrived to Washington in March 2017, and by it was brutal, I had to arrange for a summit only a few weeks later between President Abbas and President Trump.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_04: And in every meeting, the conversations, the dialogue, the chemistry was just going better and better and better.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_04: And I cannot reveal much, you know, Ambassador Rasul and I know that we have limits of what we can reveal, but I can tell you President Trump was absolutely uh listening, giving us the impression that not only he's listening, but our side of the story made absolute sense to him.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_04: He adopted most of it until we got that phone call.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_04: So they are in the business of a U-turn, and the U-turn, in my opinion, comes from a source that you know very well where.
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_04: So um let's stop there.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_03: I respect your ambassadorial protocols, diplomatic protocols.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_03: Um, but let's um let's move forward because I mean you are very strong.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_03: I just want to read a quote from you actually, um, because of course I said at the same time the United States very provocatively, as you'll remember, moved the uh uh uh embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_03: And in doing so, you then responded by saying you didn't take Jerusalem off the table, you took the table altogether.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_03: No one, no Palestinian would ever be set be able to sit on that table, good luck.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_03: And goodbye.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_03: And goodbye.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_03: And you were right.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_03: So far, that's proven to be true.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_04: Let's fast forward because the mention.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_04: I'm sorry, that contributed to the whole decision.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_04: Because for them, dialogue and negotiations is diktat.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_04: For us, it's not dictat.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_04: You need to give and take.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_04: So yes.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_04: Good luck and goodbye.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_03: Do you see what do you see as the main fundamental difference bearing in mind everything that has happened post-October the seventh, but also pre-October the seventh?
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_03: What is the big difference between term one and term two in terms of President Trump and how he approaches the question of Palestine?
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_03: That isn't a difference.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_04: Except in term two, he just completely and utterly starting with the point of not adopting the long-held US policy, which is a two-state solution, completely ditched it.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_04: Term two, he went for full support of some of Israel's main sort of strategic instigated wars.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_04: So in relative terms, second term might was not better than the first.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_03: Okay, let's fast forward to the United Kingdom.
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_03: So you mission is closed.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_03: 2018, Jeremy Corbyn's leader.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_03: I'm gonna not because we shouldn't talk about it, people could ask in the audience, but I'm gonna skip past because I want to get to where we are currently.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_03: I think Jeremy is very close to you.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_03: I think he attended your wedding as well, so you're very close.
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_03: So people can ask if they have any particular questions about Jeremy, who I think is coming to BLF next week potentially, uh as well.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_03: And I've shared a very happily shared a stage with them on the issue of Palestine.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_03: But let's get to where we are currently.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_03: We have a Prime Minister and we have a Prime Minister in waiting.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_03: I want to ask you about the current Prime Minister, who's only probably there for another week or two.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_03: Um, Keir Starmer famously said when he was leader of the opposition that Israel had the right to cut off water and power to Gaza.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_03: Many people think that, and I believe that, to be confirmation of a war crime, complicity in a war crime.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_03: He also refused Keir Starmer to call for a ceasefire while many, many months into a genocide.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_03: And to this day, the UK government sells arms to Israel.
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_03: On the flip side, the UK has sanctioned some Israeli government ministers such as Ben Gavir and Samotrich.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_03: And they have, for the first time, in my opinion, far too late, but recognized the state of Palestine.
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_03: In terms of Palestine, how does Ambassador Hussam Zumla sum up Keir Starmer's legacy?
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_03: Seriously?
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_04: And honestly, in the presence of Nasha.
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_04: I'm just curious.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_04: Well, without going into details, uh uh Sir Kristama will be remembered as far as Palestine is concerned, as the man uh during his leadership, the UK has recognized the state of Palestine.
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_04: And this is not a small measure.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_04: We understand that it was the outcome of the British people, the public opinion.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_04: We understand it was a matter for the Labour Party and the pressure from the Labour Party.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_04: Um and we have one of the fighters and a few others of the Labour Party here for this issue.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_04: We also understand the UK Parliament was there was a motion and a petition signed by more than almost 300 MPs for him to recognize, mostly Labour, of course, so the majority of his MPs.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_04: So we understand that it's it's a bottom-up, but it was under his leadership.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_04: I'll I'll I'll much was left to be desired.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_04: We in Arabic we have a saying, Babin Majjarim Khala, which means, let me translate it and it will make no sense to you in English.
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_04: It means the carpenter's door is broken.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_04: Meaning, you know, the carpenter is the one who fixes doors.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_04: So if your door is broken, then applying it on Kirstama, he's a human rights lawyer.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_04: And his door was broken and he never fixed it.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_04: Meaning that we were hoping that he would really stick to international law.
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_04: We were hoping that he would stick to his renowned career of being a lawyer all the way and a prosecutor in the International Court of Justice.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_04: We were hoping that he would be the first to adopt fully the ICJ ruling in July 2024.
• 26:46
  SPEAKER_04: We were hoping that the advisory opinion of the highest world court, which is the ICJ, would be immediately, not up for talks and negotiations, but for immediate implementation, particularly in the part of the responsibility of third parties, especially when it comes to arms embargo, full, not selective, arms embargo, sanctions not on two selected ministers, but on the entire government that is committing genocide, including, starting with Ben Yamin Netanyah, the law would have required a human rights law lawyer to make sure that it's not labeling of the settlement products.
• 27:29
  SPEAKER_04: These are illegal products being produced on stolen land by stolen resources.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_04: It should have been completely banned.
• 27:39
  SPEAKER_04: We were hoping that stolen properties, stolen properties from my land during his time would never ever be exhibited in the streets of London as happened two and or three weeks ago.
• 27:53
  SPEAKER_04: That was shameful.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_04: That was shameful to allow the sale of stolen properties on British soil.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_04: So it's a mixed picture of a man who listened to his people and took the historic decision of recognition, but could not listen to his own background and profession to really stick to international legality in a way that reflects the UK's commitment, historic commitment to the international, to the rules-based international order.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_04: And I think Nas would give me a pass for the answer.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_03: Very well said, I'm I'm going to move to Gaza very shortly.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_03: We both have family there.
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_03: Your family and your wife's family, between them, have lost dozens of members of your family.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_03: In fact, you lost a close family member just uh last week or in the last couple of weeks, and may God grant them the highest heavens and give you immense patience for such a difficult time.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_03: The issue of Gaza has fallen off the news agenda.
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_03: The so-called ceasefire, which is not a ceasefire because over a thousand people have been killed and the destruction continues.
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_03: Many people in this audience have been campaigning for almost three years relentlessly.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_03: Some people have been campaigning for decades against the injustice and historic injustice the Palestinian people have faced for that period.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_03: In terms of speaking to this audience, um, what do people need to do?
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_03: As we are not far off three years from the genocide beginning, what do people in this audience need to do to ensure that the people of Gaza are not forgotten?
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_03: And I'm gonna just add another bit of that question and forgive me, which is what do you see?
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_03: Because it feels quite despairing at the moment.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_03: What do you see and do you think is the most likely future for Gaza?
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_04: I want to just have a small little addition.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_04: The future I see is not for Gaza, the future I see is for Palestine.
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_04: That includes Gaza.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_04: Um Gaza is an inseparable beloved part of the state of Palestine.
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_04: Because there is a lot of focus, rightly so, there was a genocide on Gaza, but nothing gets me heated or angers me when I hear the term the Gazan people.
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_04: There is no such a thing as Gazans.
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_04: I am from Gaza.
• 30:23
  SPEAKER_04: There is only the Palestinian people in Gaza.
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_04: Remember, 80% of us in Gaza are not from Gaza, we are from the rest of Palestine.
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_04: Um, so answering the question, starting with Gaza, of course.
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_04: The reality is very difficult, Hamza.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_04: Uh the genocide has not ended.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_04: It's all a shared.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_04: Since the announcement of the so-called ceasefire by President Trump, Israel has committed more than 2,400 airstrikes, killing more than a thousand, a thousand people, including my cousin last week.
• 31:04
  SPEAKER_04: She was a mother, Tagrid, her name was Tagrid Zumblud.
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_04: She was a mother of six, she's 51 years old.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_04: That tells you we were growing up together at the very same age, same time.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_04: Um, and I was devastated to learn of her murder by an Israeli drone.
• 31:23
  SPEAKER_04: They shot her in the back as she was hanging the clothes of her kids in the backyard of whatever left over her home.
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_04: Tagrid is among ten that were killed on that day.
• 31:38
  SPEAKER_04: So every day there are killings.
• 31:40
  SPEAKER_04: The situation in Gaza is complete, complete destitute.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_04: Uh people, more than 1.5 million, live in uninhabitable places, as you know and following.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_04: Diseases spreading, no health sector.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_04: So what Israel is doing in Gaza has been declared by the Israeli Prime Minister already and his defense, so-called defense or war minister, that you know we we support uh voluntary immigration.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_04: Did you hear that?
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_04: That was last time.
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_04: Voluntary migration.
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_04: And what they offer to our people in Gaza, here are the two choices they are offering.
• 32:18
  SPEAKER_04: Either you die or you leave.
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_04: And they took, they call that voluntary.
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_04: These are the choices you have.
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_04: So this is the situation in Gaza right now.
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_04: The situation in the West Bank is not much better.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_04: I have just returned from the West Bank a couple of weeks ago.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_04: And it's unbelievable, even for somebody like me who should be informed and prepared.
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_04: I was not even prepared for what I saw in the West Bank.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_04: The level of settler terrorism, and by the way, it's such a mistake to call it settler terrorism.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_04: I had struggled to use the word terrorism here in the UK until the Foreign Secretary of the UK, Vit Kuber, used the word, the T word terrorism, uh, next to settlers only a couple of days ago, good, a couple of weeks ago.
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_04: Very good.
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_04: That's an achievement.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_04: But this is not, these are not just settlers, by the way.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_04: Those militias that I have seen it with my own eyes in the West Bank, they are Israeli army reservists, reservoir, whatever you call it.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_04: They just take off their uniforms.
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, and then they go attack communities.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_04: So this is a state-sponsored terrorism.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_04: Paramilitary, almost a state-sponsored terrorism in the West Bank, all over the West Bank.
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_04: I'm not gonna go into the level of settlement expansion, the roadblocks, the house demolitions.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_04: You know the story?
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_04: The the collapsing of our health institutions in the West Bank, our education institutions, because of the withholding of our own money.
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_04: So now they are literally collapsing out via uh via financial means.
• 33:55
  SPEAKER_04: Now, this is the reality now.
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_04: However, you know it's the saying we can see a light at the end of the tunnel.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_04: Well, let me tell you, we are certainly we don't see an end of the tunnel.
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_04: We are in the middle of the tunnel, but I see a light in the middle of the side of the of the tunnel.
• 34:15
  SPEAKER_04: So let me, you and I today change that that saying, a light at the end of the tunnel.
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_04: You can actually sometimes see a light in the middle of the tunnel, and we see it.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_04: We see it because back to your earlier question, because you know what, Hamza?
• 34:32
  SPEAKER_04: Because uh uh the globe has has has become Palestinized, and Palestine has become globalized.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_04: The globe has become Palestinized, and Palestine has become globalized.
• 34:49
  SPEAKER_04: Let me explain.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_04: Um Palestine, now we call it global Palestine.
• 34:55
  SPEAKER_04: It has become global Palestine.
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_04: This, the Kofiya, is becoming a global symbol.
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_04: Not just cultural symbol, it's a it's a global political symbol of where you stand as a human being.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_04: You stand with justice, you stand with people's rights.
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_04: It almost has become as a political manifesto.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_04: And I we see the movement, we see the change, we see this not just in the UK, by the way, all over Europe, in the US.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_04: Are you following what is happening in the US?
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_04: Many people thought that Mamdani was just a one-off phenomenon.
• 35:31
  SPEAKER_04: Many people thought Mamdani was the cause of something.
• 35:37
  SPEAKER_04: No, he was the product of something.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_04: He was the product of a people in New York, in the East Coast, all over the US.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_04: And look at that movement, they are bringing many Mamdanis now.
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_04: Many Mamdanis.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_04: Things are changing everywhere.
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_04: And yes, I am hopeful.
• 35:54
  SPEAKER_04: I am hopeful because look, okay, Israel has committed genocide, Israel has destroyed the vast of Gaza, my refugee camp is gone, the city I lived in, Rafah, is gone.
• 36:05
  SPEAKER_04: I dread the day, I go back to Rafah because I will have nothing to remember.
• 36:09
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, my kindergarten, my schools, my streets are gone.
• 36:13
  SPEAKER_04: The falafel shob, I hate them for the falafel shob because I used to love that falafel shop so much.
• 36:20
  SPEAKER_04: Am I allowed to swear?
• 36:21
  SPEAKER_04: Of course.
• 36:22
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_04: Everything is gone.
• 36:25
  SPEAKER_04: So my father, his original village is gone.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_04: I am my my my place of birth is gone.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_04: It's a recurrent thing.
• 36:32
  SPEAKER_04: Yet, yet, the mask has slept, my friend.
• 36:36
  SPEAKER_04: And the people of the world are awakened.
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_04: And this is very serious.
• 36:40
  SPEAKER_04: And if you look strategically, okay, Israel destroyed everything.
• 36:43
  SPEAKER_04: They have the machines.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_04: Yes?
• 36:47
  SPEAKER_04: Destroyed everything.
• 36:48
  SPEAKER_04: But strategically speaking, what did Israel gain?
• 36:53
  SPEAKER_04: Netanyahu has always propagated since he became a prime minister 25 years ago, one doctrine, one school of thought managing the conflict.
• 37:05
  SPEAKER_04: Not resolving it, managing the conflict.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_04: But then what happened on the 7th of October and what followed was just a slab in his face that this conflict simply cannot be managed forever.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_04: You cannot divide the Palestinian and rule them and blockade them.
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_04: You know Netanyahu used to actually allow and permit and push Israeli soldiers to carry bags of cash every single month.
• 37:34
  SPEAKER_04: 30 million dollars to go to what?
• 37:37
  SPEAKER_04: To who?
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_04: To who?
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_04: To Hamas.
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_04: Because he wanted to manage the division, manage the conflict because that will block any possibility of the unity of the Palestinian people, territory, and political system, and therefore block the emergence of a two-state solution.
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_04: That doctrine is gone.
• 37:55
  SPEAKER_04: Smotrich has a different doctrine.
• 37:57
  SPEAKER_04: We call it in Arabic and in Hebrew it's similar, Hasim.
• 38:00
  SPEAKER_04: Hasmisrabah means they want to finish off, they want to have total victory, they want the entire Palestinian people out.
• 38:06
  SPEAKER_04: That has also failed.
• 38:08
  SPEAKER_04: Because you have deployed genocide.
• 38:11
  SPEAKER_04: You have committed genocide, and still the Palestinian people are there.
• 38:15
  SPEAKER_04: On their land.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_04: They are not leaving our homes.
• 38:17
  SPEAKER_04: My cousin Tagreed died in half and in her half-destroyed home.
• 38:22
  SPEAKER_04: She died standing, she destroyed her in her back, but she decided to stay in her home in the north of Gaza, defying the very idea of Hasmisra, of total victory.
• 38:33
  SPEAKER_04: Our people remain.
• 38:34
  SPEAKER_04: And they will remain in Gaza, they will remain in the West Bank.
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_04: Also, all of a sudden the cost of occupation is rising, the cost of illegality is rising, the cost of oppression is rising.
• 38:44
  SPEAKER_04: Not just because of the change in the public opinion, but the legal, the legal side of the story and many other sides.
• 38:51
  SPEAKER_04: So, yes, I see the light at the end of the tunnel.
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_04: Lastly, this is the global Palestine.
• 38:58
  SPEAKER_04: But also on the other side, that the globe has been Palestinized because Israel is exporting all the terror methods and other governments are adopting the very same.
• 39:11
  SPEAKER_04: You know, now we in Palestine have been just taken as testing grounds, as guinea pigs.
• 39:18
  SPEAKER_04: They are using all the murderous technology against children.
• 39:23
  SPEAKER_04: They are using AI and facial recognitions for mass murder.
• 39:30
  SPEAKER_04: So it is this moment for humanity.
• 39:33
  SPEAKER_04: That's why our issue is no longer a political issue only.
• 39:36
  SPEAKER_04: This moment for the entire humanity is a moment when those who fight for Palestine are not just fighting for Palestinians.
• 39:43
  SPEAKER_04: Everybody realizes we are fighting for our humanity, we are fighting for our lives, we are fighting for our children as well.
• 39:50
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
• 39:51
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you, Sam.
• 40:01
  SPEAKER_03: Let's get to the audience.
• 40:03
  SPEAKER_03: We've got limited time.
• 40:04
  SPEAKER_03: Please put your hands up.
• 40:05
  SPEAKER_03: We're going to try to take a few questions at a time.
• 40:07
  SPEAKER_03: So we're going to take there's a roving mic going around.
• 40:09
  SPEAKER_03: Is it kind of a gentleman in the middle of the aisle here?
• 40:12
  SPEAKER_03: And then there's somebody uh at the front as well with glasses.
• 40:15
  SPEAKER_03: But there's a gentleman, can you keep your hand up, gentlemen in the middle?
• 40:18
  SPEAKER_03: That's right.
• 40:19
  SPEAKER_03: Uh is there a microphone coming?
• 40:21
  SPEAKER_03: And if you don't mind giving us your name, if you don't mind, it's up to you.
• 40:25
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, and then just ask your question.
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_03: Please keep it very tight, and then we're going to move to the person here at the front as well with the glasses.
• 40:34
  SPEAKER_03: Microphone is coming to you.
• 40:36
  SPEAKER_03: And then there's one next to you.
• 40:38
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you, and thank you both for um an incredible conversation.
• 40:42
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, there seems to me to be a bit of a disconnect between this incredibly impressive man in front of me, Ambassador Dom Lot, and some of the things I've been told about the organization he belongs to, Fatah, because I have been told many times, including by Palestinian friends, that Fatah and the Palestinian Authority have all too often worked hand in glove with the Israeli occupation, policing Palestinians in the West Bank and so on.
• 41:09
  SPEAKER_02: And that's another thing that partly explains the electoral gains that were made by Hamas.
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_02: Um I'm curious to know how you how you would respond to that.
• 41:20
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you.
• 41:21
  SPEAKER_03: And there's a question here at the front.
• 41:22
  SPEAKER_03: We're going to take two at a time.
• 41:24
  SPEAKER_03: By the way, to add to that, I'm going to add a question in, uh, which is that, Husam, you recently went for the Central Committee of Fatah.
• 41:32
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, everybody thought that you would be a fantastic addition to that central committee, which is a very powerful committee in Fatah.
• 41:38
  SPEAKER_03: You didn't make it on.
• 41:39
  SPEAKER_03: We want to know why not and what happened there in the inside story.
• 41:42
  SPEAKER_03: Please, sir.
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_01: Uh thank you.
• 41:44
  SPEAKER_01: Um, Shuqran Hussam.
• 41:46
  SPEAKER_01: Um, just a very quick preface: my grandfather spent the Second World War in Palestine and stayed and died, was killed in 1947 in Haifa.
• 41:55
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm very sorry of what's happened.
• 41:58
  SPEAKER_01: It's horrendous everywhere.
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_01: But I it's meant that we've always known what's happened and been happening.
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_01: And uh one of my oldest friends in the region, Yusuf Habic, you know his sister Sandra, I think, in Batamhuri, um in Palestine, um, where I've been to see them.
• 42:16
  SPEAKER_01: I lived in Cairo and looking at the whole region.
• 42:19
  SPEAKER_01: And my background is finance and investment banking, and I've given a talk at the Palestine Stock Exchange.
• 42:25
  SPEAKER_01: We always look at risk.
• 42:28
  SPEAKER_01: And one of the things we see, we look at politics.
• 42:31
  SPEAKER_01: I'm going to correct very quickly.
• 42:34
  SPEAKER_01: We all know the horrors of 80 years and particularly three years.
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_01: What is going to happen in probability terms to your wonderful people in the next few years, given all the elections in Israel, in the UK, in America?
• 42:48
  SPEAKER_01: What you think will where will we be in three years?
• 42:53
  SPEAKER_03: And let's take one more.
• 42:54
  SPEAKER_03: I know I have to take two, but I think we've got one more here as well.
• 42:58
  SPEAKER_00: Please.
• 42:59
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 42:59
  SPEAKER_00: Same alaikum rahmatullah, and thank you so much for the wonderful uh conversation.
• 43:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's such an honor to be here, mashallah.
• 43:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um I'm a history teacher in a secondary school, um, and I've just come away from teaching um some pupils about uh St.
• 43:14
  SPEAKER_00: George because uh especially given that you're the ambassador to the United Kingdom, um, we've been teaching in schools that St.
• 43:22
  SPEAKER_00: George, the patron state of this country, especially relevant at the moment because of the World Cup and the St.
• 43:26
  SPEAKER_00: George's flag everywhere, that he was Palestinian or half-Palestinian.
• 43:30
  SPEAKER_00: And we went through the history with the pupils, the U8 students in in school, and uh that's about 12-year-olds, 13-year-old.
• 43:37
  SPEAKER_00: And uh we looked at how you know, born in 275 AD, the time of the Romans, um, they had the name, you know, Syria Palestina for the province, for the area, not called Israel at the time, called Syria Palestina province.
• 43:52
  SPEAKER_00: And so definitely was a Palestinian, the patron state of this country.
• 43:55
  SPEAKER_00: What can we do, inshallah, going forward in terms of more work in that area?
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_00: Particularly with the marches and the political climate, and can we work potentially with yourself?
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_00: We're an independent school, so that means that we get the curriculum kind of control in our own hands.
• 44:11
  SPEAKER_00: Is there any scope for working inshallah with you with yourself, inshallah?
• 44:14
  SPEAKER_03: We'll go to Hassam and we're gonna try to keep the answers brief.
• 44:17
  SPEAKER_03: And we've had three men, so I'm gonna come back and we're gonna try to get some women in the audience asking some questions and the last questions of the session.
• 44:23
  SPEAKER_03: Hussain, your answers first.
• 44:30
  SPEAKER_04: The issue of Fateh.
• 44:31
  SPEAKER_04: Fateh is the national movement.
• 44:35
  SPEAKER_04: Let's separate between the Fateh as a national movement and the authority, the Palestinian Authority, which was formed to undertake some of the responsibility of the PLO under the Oslo Accords and the arena of health services, social services, security services, what have you.
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_04: But Fateh, if you want to compare it in the presence of our brother Brahim Rasul here, Fateh is the ANC, not the state of South Africa.
• 45:03
  SPEAKER_04: And Fateh was founded by great leaders that believe that Palestine is a national issue.
• 45:11
  SPEAKER_04: And it's up to the Palestinian people to take up the struggle and liberate our land.
• 45:18
  SPEAKER_04: But it's also a global issue with the help of our friends worldwide.
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_04: That's why Yas Arafat was seen with Nelson Mandela more than any other leader.
• 45:30
  SPEAKER_04: And that's why Nelson Mandela did say that the freedom of South Africa is incomplete without the freedom of Palestine.
• 45:37
  SPEAKER_04: So Fatah is a national liberation movement.
• 45:41
  SPEAKER_04: Now the PA has its issues, and you know, and the issue, the main issue is that it was supposed to be created only for five years.
• 45:49
  SPEAKER_04: It's an interim arrangement that it will give way for, or it will be a transitional entity vehicle for it to become a sovereign independent state.
• 45:59
  SPEAKER_04: We got stuck because Israel did not was not faithful to Oslo and was never faithful to any agreement we have ever signed.
• 46:07
  SPEAKER_04: And not just us.
• 46:09
  SPEAKER_04: Us, Jordan, Egypt, and what have you, Syria.
• 46:13
  SPEAKER_04: And therefore we got stuck in this limbo of an interim arrangement that was supposed to last for five years, but now it's lasting 25 years.
• 46:22
  SPEAKER_04: So I think there, with regards to the PA, especially after the recognition of several countries, now we have more than almost 160 countries recognizing the state of Palestine, of course, including the UK of late.
• 46:35
  SPEAKER_04: Now we need to consider directly and how do we actually move to the stage of a state rather than interim arrangements, and how can we redefine our relationship internally and regionally and globally in a way that increases uh leverage.
• 46:50
  SPEAKER_04: I'll tell you why I joined Fateh, my friend.
• 46:52
  SPEAKER_04: I joined Fateh because I, you know, as a as a growing-up young man, I I literally fall in love with my people, and I saw myself purely as Palestinian.
• 47:04
  SPEAKER_04: I am so proud to be Palestinian, and I needed a national movement to reflect that passion and that pride.
• 47:11
  SPEAKER_04: With all love and respect to all other political movements in Palestine, some of them would import Soviet Union ideas, you know, and you know, communism.
• 47:21
  SPEAKER_04: Some of them will import, rightly so, that politics is seen from the prism of religion, whether either, and we have Muslims and we have Christians in Palestine.
• 47:31
  SPEAKER_04: I don't.
• 47:32
  SPEAKER_04: I see the Muslim as a Palestinian, I see the Christian as a Palestinian, I see St.
• 47:38
  SPEAKER_04: George as Palestinian, I see Jesus as Palestinian, uh, and and we are all under that uh national umbrella, and that's why, because you know, I refuse to believe that our people and our nation uh uh uh uh lack uh uh people's hood and lack nationhood.
• 47:59
  SPEAKER_04: We are a vivid, rooted nation, and there begins the liberation and and there and there uh begins the sense of togetherness.
• 48:08
  SPEAKER_04: Uh you reminded me about St.
• 48:10
  SPEAKER_04: George.
• 48:10
  SPEAKER_04: Yes, St.
• 48:11
  SPEAKER_04: George is Palestinian, not half Palestinian.
• 48:13
  SPEAKER_04: Khadr, his name is.
• 48:15
  SPEAKER_04: You reminded me when I first arrived to the UK, and this is the first time I'm gonna say this story, and hopefully Saima will not pick it as a reel and run with it.
• 48:27
  SPEAKER_04: And I arrived in December.
• 48:29
  SPEAKER_04: I was in the US, just kicked out of the US by Trump first.
• 48:35
  SPEAKER_04: Oh, another difference between me and Ambassador Rasul, I was Trump kicked by Trump first, he was kicked by Trump second.
• 48:43
  SPEAKER_04: Um I had just arrived in in December, and the first thing I got was an invitation by Her Majesty the Queen for the Christmas reception for ambassadors diplomats.
• 49:00
  SPEAKER_04: And I go, and then the Foreign Office was very kind to arrange for me what they call private audience, so you have time alone with the Queen.
• 49:12
  SPEAKER_04: And then you know, I was waiting by a door, the door opens.
• 49:17
  SPEAKER_04: My wife and I were standing there, then she comes, of course.
• 49:20
  SPEAKER_04: By the way, what a lady, what a human being, what a what a woman.
• 49:25
  SPEAKER_04: Uh and you feel in her presence something very, very special, I have to say.
• 49:29
  SPEAKER_04: May she rest in eternal peace.
• 49:31
  SPEAKER_04: Uh so one of the protocol officers says, the ambassador from Palestine, and then she looks rather amused.
• 49:38
  SPEAKER_04: Oh, by the way, the protocol were all over me before it, what to say and what not to say, and how to kneel and all that.
• 49:43
  SPEAKER_04: They made my life so difficult.
• 49:45
  SPEAKER_04: I was panicking.
• 49:46
  SPEAKER_04: I should not say your majesty twice.
• 49:48
  SPEAKER_04: Did you know that?
• 49:49
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, your majesty, and then ma'am.
• 49:51
  SPEAKER_04: Then ma'am.
• 49:52
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, you are not supposed to talk or answer unless she asks.
• 49:56
  SPEAKER_04: All that, anyway.
• 49:58
  SPEAKER_04: So the man says, the ambassador from Palestine, the Queen looks at me and she said, Oh, Palestine.
• 50:03
  SPEAKER_04: I said, Yes, Your Majesty.
• 50:05
  SPEAKER_04: And I am so excited to have just arrived at Christmas.
• 50:10
  SPEAKER_04: Christmas time.
• 50:11
  SPEAKER_04: She was very amused.
• 50:12
  SPEAKER_04: She said, Why is that?
• 50:14
  SPEAKER_04: I said, Your Majesty, I made a mistake.
• 50:16
  SPEAKER_04: You see, I did I did it twice already.
• 50:17
  SPEAKER_04: And the protocol man was panicking all over the place, almost fainting, like, oh my God.
• 50:24
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, I said, She said, Why are you excited to have arrived at Christmas time?
• 50:28
  SPEAKER_04: I said, Your Majesty, because I come from Christmas land.
• 50:32
  SPEAKER_04: She said, What?
• 50:33
  SPEAKER_04: I said, I come from Christmas land.
• 50:36
  SPEAKER_04: Remember Bethlehem?
• 50:37
  SPEAKER_04: She said, Yes, oh yes.
• 50:39
  SPEAKER_04: She said, I said, and also Jesus is our gift to you, Your Majesty, and to the rest of the world.
• 50:45
  SPEAKER_04: And a whole lot of conversation began.
• 50:47
  SPEAKER_04: We were supposed to stay a few minutes.
• 50:50
  SPEAKER_04: It went on and on and on, the conversation.
• 50:52
  SPEAKER_04: But yes, our history has been stolen.
• 50:55
  SPEAKER_04: We are the people of the book.
• 50:57
  SPEAKER_04: Palestine is so sacred to Islam, Christianity, and Judaism.
• 51:01
  SPEAKER_04: And we are proud of that.
• 51:02
  SPEAKER_04: But all of them are Palestinians.
• 51:05
  SPEAKER_04: All of them are Palestinians.
• 51:07
  SPEAKER_04: And we are so proud of that, of that uh preciousness of our history.
• 51:13
  SPEAKER_04: The book, the Bible, is a Palestinian book, and it has been used against us.
• 51:19
  SPEAKER_04: It has been rewritten to be used against the people of the book.
• 51:23
  SPEAKER_04: We are the original Christians.
• 51:25
  SPEAKER_04: All the names that you see here, all the saints that you hear about came from my land.
• 51:30
  SPEAKER_04: And I'm so proud about that.
• 51:32
  SPEAKER_04: Spreading Jesus' message worldwide.
• 51:35
  SPEAKER_04: And not just uh St.
• 51:36
  SPEAKER_04: George, by the way, for that matter.
• 51:38
  SPEAKER_04: But I'm glad St.
• 51:39
  SPEAKER_04: George ended up there, the symbol of Britain and England.
• 51:43
  SPEAKER_04: And I can go on and on, but because you are a history teacher, we can have a chat afterwards.
• 51:50
  SPEAKER_04: Because I am as fascinating.
• 51:52
  SPEAKER_04: And by the way, if Hamza allows me, there is such a fight now with the British Museum that I have been involved in.
• 52:00
  SPEAKER_04: And the British Museum is doing something that it should really reconsider.
• 52:04
  SPEAKER_04: Because the museums, particularly the British one, British Museum, given the history, must be guardians of history.
• 52:12
  SPEAKER_04: Must be there to open spaces of learning, not be politicized.
• 52:16
  SPEAKER_04: But with some campaign on them, they change the designation of Palestine, ancient Palestine, and contemporary Palestine.
• 52:24
  SPEAKER_04: And that tells you, our teacher of history, how important history is.
• 52:28
  SPEAKER_04: You know why?
• 52:28
  SPEAKER_04: Because they cannot erase a nation in its present unless they erase them in it in their what?
• 52:34
  SPEAKER_04: In their past.
• 52:36
  SPEAKER_04: They need to erase our past, our history.
• 52:42
  SPEAKER_04: Last sentence, we will not allow them to erase our history.
• 52:46
  SPEAKER_04: We will not allow them to erase our present.
• 52:48
  SPEAKER_04: And we assure you, we will build a future that you and your pupils here, the British kids, will be proud of.
• 52:57
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 53:01
  SPEAKER_03: I'm afraid, like all good politicians, I'm going to renege my promise of going back to the audience.
• 53:06
  SPEAKER_03: Um because uh forgive me, I know the organizers only have 15 minutes to turn this room round, so they only have now 10 minutes to turn this room round for the next event.
• 53:15
  SPEAKER_03: So, ladies and gentlemen, um, and I am chatting another uh event uh tomorrow, so I promise that um I'll take female question audience members first uh for those questions.
• 53:24
  SPEAKER_03: Ladies and gentlemen, uh I think you'll agree with me, it's been a fascinating insight from Ambassador Hussam Zumlat.
• 53:30
  SPEAKER_03: I think many in the crowd will also agree with me, and he can't say anything, and neither he should, that one day we hope to see Ambassador Hussam Zumlot as President Hussam Zumlot of the Palestinian people and of Palestine and the state of Palestine.
• 53:43
  SPEAKER_03: So I look forward to that day, and perhaps I'll get an invitation from Allah Hussam Zumlot Ambassador Hussein.