0:00

In the coming week, Ukraine and Russia

0:02

enter year three of their wide-scale war. U.S.

0:05

Secretary of State Blinken makes his first official

0:07

visit to Brazil and Argentina, and

0:10

the WTO holds an important ministerial

0:12

conference amid gathering trade gloom. It's

0:15

February 22, 2024, in time for The World Next Week. I'm

0:31

Bob McMahon. And I'm Carly Ann Robbins. Well,

0:34

Carla, we're going to start in

0:36

Ukraine because this Saturday is two

0:38

years since Russia's large-scale invasion of

0:40

Ukraine. It's also around this time,

0:43

10 years ago, that Russia

0:45

illegally annexed Crimea. Now, Ukraine

0:47

has sought to both reclaim that territory

0:49

and parts of its Eastern territory, as

0:51

well as winning the war outright, but

0:53

things are looking pretty grim at this

0:55

point. And we should note, you

0:57

just spoke about this on our affiliate

0:59

podcast, The President's Inbox, with Jim Lindsay

1:02

and Miriam Elder. But can you talk

1:04

to us at this point, Carla, as we look

1:06

at sort of the sides

1:08

posturing, making statements about aid and sanctions

1:11

and so forth, what

1:13

are you watching as we reach this point in

1:15

the war? So, Bob, the

1:17

Ukrainians have shown remarkable resilience, and it's really

1:19

important to remember that this war for them,

1:22

while we've been focused on it just for

1:24

two years, for them it really has been

1:26

going on for a decade. And

1:28

they have taken out a large part

1:31

of Russia's Black Sea fleet, so it's

1:33

not completely grim. But the

1:35

news on the ground, you know, as we start year

1:37

three of this phase of the war, it's

1:39

really pretty awful. There are a growing number

1:41

of analysts who are beginning to ask how

1:43

much longer Ukraine can hold on, especially

1:46

if the U.S. Congress fails to pass

1:48

more aid, and that's really critical. We

1:51

hold a lot of their fate in our hands. Last

1:54

week, the Russians captured Avdivka, which is

1:56

a small city in the eastern Donbas.

2:00

described as their first significant battlefield

2:02

victory since Black Moon, the failure

2:04

of a Ukrainian counteroffensive last year. And

2:07

Russian losses were reported to be especially

2:09

heavy. And there was a pro-Kremlin blogger

2:11

who may or may not have committed

2:13

suicide afterwards, but he

2:15

posted as many as 17,000 Russians were killed in

2:18

the fight. But it was

2:20

a Ukrainian defeat, and it was seen as a

2:22

warning of how much Ukraine's forces are struggling

2:24

as they run increasingly low on weapons,

2:26

on ammunition, and on manpower. And

2:29

the U.S. hasn't sent any aid since December, and

2:31

the Ukrainians are particularly short on artillery shells. And

2:33

I just read this morning that they are firing

2:35

less than a fifth of what the Russians are

2:38

firing. And that's really bad

2:40

math. Western analysts were

2:42

downplaying this strategic importance of

2:44

this small town until

2:47

news came that hundreds and possibly up

2:49

to 1,000 Ukrainians may have been captured

2:51

in the retreat. And

2:53

this is a huge blow to their

2:55

morale at a time when they're talking

2:57

about having a very large conscription, something

2:59

that the parliament is resisting. So

3:02

not enough artillery shells, not

3:04

enough manpower, and certainly

3:07

not enough support for the United States. So

3:09

this is a really bad situation itself. The

3:12

Europeans say they want to do more. They

3:14

seem committed to doing more, but they really

3:16

don't have the resources. Although

3:19

I was really impressed when speaking at

3:21

the Munich Security Council last week, the

3:23

Danish Prime Minister, Medha Fredricksen, pushed

3:25

her colleagues to dig deeper into their own

3:27

current stocks and said that she was committed

3:30

to providing what she said was

3:32

all of Denmark's artillery. So

3:34

that's sort of symbolic support. And

3:37

if the Europeans dig deep, maybe the Ukrainians

3:39

can hold on in 2024 and

3:41

start to do the rebuilding. But

3:43

it's really on a nice edge. The

3:46

European Side of this, I think, is

3:48

particularly important to focus on. As You

3:50

said, it was the front and center

3:52

issue dominating the Munich Security Conference and

3:54

obviously the killing of Navalny in his

3:56

Siberian prison was a part of a

3:59

piece of the. Russian menace or

4:01

would seem to be recommended. Europeans

4:03

do consider this serious. Some take

4:05

more serious than others the threat

4:07

of what next if Ukraine false

4:09

scenario. But I do think as

4:11

Denmark demonstrated as other states certainly

4:14

can, there's is a way to

4:16

get creative here, if not just

4:18

purely ramp up in terms of

4:20

arms and eight and so forth.

4:22

I mean, are they really ready

4:24

to lead a coalition of Russia,

4:26

Iran, and North Korea? A you

4:28

know, rally to. Start taking chunks

4:31

of Ukrainian territory, and that's an overstatement,

4:33

but still. Russia's definitely benefited from Iranian

4:35

drones in North Korean armaments to help

4:38

hold it's own. While it. We.

4:40

Build its capabilities And as you

4:42

say, Ukraine needs the help of

4:44

outside nations. It needs these anti

4:47

aircraft weaponry and protective missiles and

4:49

just the ability to hold it's

4:51

current territory. I. Guess to

4:53

The final thing is that what with

4:56

Western forces should be trying to do

4:58

to galvanize this is rally around a

5:00

coherent strategy that maybe something on lines

5:02

of what Bob Gates has been Same

5:04

inform Us Defense secretary which is like

5:07

let's let's treat this as holding onto

5:09

the territory Ukraine currently has and doing

5:11

the best she can and providing a

5:13

bit of throw weight into Russia where

5:15

you can as well Well. As

5:18

he said, obviously there are

5:20

differences in my would be

5:22

negotiating strategy in get Crimea

5:24

back. It's interesting Re and

5:26

us right now we're talking

5:28

survival and I think there

5:30

are certainly some European countries

5:32

that are willing to do

5:34

more. Honest than a

5:37

wakeup call. Certainly for all of Europe,

5:39

which is why they're ramping up defense

5:41

production. They're breaking grants a new factories.

5:43

They are talking about what they can

5:45

provide in the near term, but. a

5:47

lot of stuff isn't gonna come on

5:49

line for a couple years so when

5:51

fredrickson gets up and send the munich

5:53

security council and she says i'm sorry

5:56

to say friends they're still ammunitions in

5:58

stock in europe This is not only

6:00

a question about production because we have

6:02

weapons, we have ammunition, we have air

6:04

defenses that we don't have to use ourselves at

6:06

this moment that we should deliver to

6:08

Ukraine. So there's still stuff there

6:10

and if the United States can't

6:13

deliver it, they're going to have to dig deep

6:15

and deliver it because I think

6:17

the warning of this defeat in this

6:19

small town really is that the Ukrainians,

6:21

you know, the numbers are

6:23

not good here and getting them to

6:26

hold on for another year. But

6:28

we have got to pass this aid bill

6:30

and I suppose, you know,

6:32

the White House may have a plan B, there may

6:35

be creative ways to do things that can be sold

6:37

to other countries that can then be delivered to Ukraine

6:39

that would not be in the spirit of what Congress

6:41

is doing. But this is an

6:43

existential fight for the Ukrainians, but honestly and truly

6:45

this is an existential fight for Europe and for

6:47

us. It is in fact and

6:49

in symbol, it's a call to arms and I

6:52

think 2024, you know, we may look at

6:55

this as a pivotal year pro or

6:57

con in terms of what way things go in this war.

6:59

And as we speak, we still don't know what's going to

7:01

happen in terms of the US House

7:03

deliberations, which continue to be ever more

7:05

fraught. But I do think there is

7:08

not only more resources, but some ingenuity

7:10

that could come to bear in the

7:12

European side. And partly I say that

7:14

because of what you mentioned about the

7:16

Black Sea victory, which was in part

7:19

a good deal of ingenuity and kind of

7:21

outfoxing the Russian hold on the Black Sea

7:23

ports and allowing not only

7:25

some maneuverability, but the ability to get

7:27

grain out of Ukraine, which is vital

7:30

for Ukraine's farmers, for its economy, but also

7:32

for markets that have relied on, especially in

7:35

the Middle East and North Africa. Well,

7:38

Ukraine also has a difficult political

7:40

situation. I mean, they are going

7:42

to need more troops and their

7:44

parliament is resisting this conscription. And

7:48

the trajectory is really important for politics and this

7:50

is a democracy as well. It's a flawed democracy,

7:53

but it is this is a democracy as well.

7:56

And obviously, if they see defeats on the battlefield and

7:58

they see... hundreds of

8:00

potentially thousand people were captured in a

8:02

chaotic retreat from this town. The

8:05

politics of this is difficult as well, but if Europe is

8:07

going to support them and we are going to press to

8:09

support them, they have to continue to be resilient. They can

8:12

say, we have, you know, we're fighting for you. And I

8:14

think it's a legitimate argument they make, but they're going to

8:16

also have to push forward politically and

8:18

they are fighting and dying. There's no question

8:20

about it, but we're going to

8:22

push them to continue to do something that is

8:24

really, really hard so that we can do something

8:27

that's really easy, which is voting more aid. Bob,

8:30

let's move across the globe to

8:32

South America, where, as you said,

8:34

Tony Blinken is wrapping up his

8:36

first official trip to Brazil for

8:39

this G20 ministerial. And then on

8:41

to Argentina. This honestly doesn't sound

8:43

like a lot of fun for

8:45

him. Between Lula's in Brazil comparing Israel

8:47

to the Nazis and Malay's love affair

8:49

with Donald Trump in Argentina. Is

8:51

this trip all about damage control

8:54

and avoiding trying to have

8:56

as few joint press availabilities as

8:58

possible with these two leaders, or is he hoping

9:00

to achieve something more? Well,

9:03

it's about showing up. To paraphrase Woody

9:05

Allen, you know, 90% of

9:07

life is showing up. And I think in

9:09

this case, it's more than that, though. It's

9:11

two important countries in the hemisphere, in the

9:13

global South, but also two kind

9:15

of different universes in a way at the

9:18

moment. You have the meeting in Brazil, which

9:20

as we're taping this podcast was due to

9:22

be wrapping up. And it

9:25

started out with very strong comments

9:27

or overtones about what's playing out

9:29

in the Israel-Hamas war, especially in

9:31

Gaza with, as you said, the

9:33

strong comments from Lula. And

9:36

Lula had a what was called a

9:38

frank discussion with Blinken for about 90

9:40

minutes or so before the G20 kicked

9:42

off, where they said they held different

9:45

opinions on the way things are playing

9:47

out in terms of trying to find

9:49

a humanitarian relief for Palestinians

9:51

huddled in places like Rafah while

9:54

the Israelis continue to push ahead with

9:56

their plan to eliminate Hamas. And

9:59

you saw undisputed. In a

10:01

really strong difference's opinion, apparently Turkish

10:03

officials spoke up as well at

10:05

the G20 meeting about Israel's actions

10:07

vis-a-vis Hamas in Gaza. And

10:10

Blinken, representing the US, which had vetoed a

10:12

recent ceasefire effort in the UN Security Council,

10:14

calls in the G20 for reforming the UN

10:16

Security Council. So very much this

10:18

overtone playing over things. And then one

10:21

expects to have more discussion about the

10:23

Ukraine side of the geopolitics concluding

10:26

day with Sergey Lavrov, the Russian

10:28

foreign minister, to speak. David

10:30

Cameron, the British foreign secretary, has said he

10:32

plans to speak out about Russia's actions

10:35

in Ukraine. And so we could have

10:37

some fireworks that were wrapping up the G20. And again,

10:39

it's important for Blinken to be there to

10:41

be stressing the US role and goals. And

10:44

then he proceeds to go to Argentina, where

10:46

the new president, Mille, couldn't have a more

10:49

different position vis-a-vis Israel. One of his first

10:51

trips abroad after being elected was to Israel,

10:54

where on arrival he announced Argentina

10:56

would be moving its embassy to

10:58

Jerusalem. He had a warm meeting

11:00

with Benjamin Netanyahu. And

11:02

he also, it should be noted, represents a country

11:04

with a very large, one of the largest Jewish

11:06

populations in South America, something like 250,000 live in

11:08

Argentina. He's

11:11

also, though, has a different viewpoint on

11:13

the global South and global politics in

11:16

general. Not a big fan

11:18

of the BRICS decided to end plans for

11:20

Argentina to join that. Obviously, Lula is a

11:22

founding member of the BRICS, his country's founding

11:24

member. And he's a strong proponent of this

11:26

other global voice in international affairs. And

11:29

then there's the US-Argentina dynamic. And Mille is sometimes

11:31

an abused term. But this case, I think it's

11:33

safe to say, he is a darling of the

11:35

right in the United States right now. He's

11:38

due to speak at a conservative conference that

11:40

takes place in the coming days. CPAC, yes.

11:42

CPAC in the Washington area. I think it's

11:44

at National Harbor. Rumored that

11:47

he might end up having a meeting with

11:49

the presumed Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump. And

11:52

libertarian places like Cato Institute have been

11:54

regularly writing about what Mille could do

11:56

and how important his objectives are. In

11:59

Argentina, for He's had

12:02

already some difficulties in legislation in terms

12:04

of trying to move forward with some

12:06

of his more ambitious reforms because he

12:09

does not have a majority political coalition.

12:12

But at the same time, he's still

12:14

moving ahead with plans to deal with

12:16

the peso's value, cut government subsidies, which

12:18

is always something that's easier to say than

12:20

to do. He has plans to slash government ministries.

12:23

I think he's already slashed them something like 18

12:25

to nine. He

12:27

represents a movement that he says was

12:30

absolutely necessary to take advantage of this

12:32

atrocious state of economic affairs in Argentina,

12:34

which is true. Very high poverty level,

12:36

crazy inflation level, much different

12:38

than the US, by the way, although he'll hear

12:40

an earful from the CPEC members about the state

12:42

of the US economy as well. As

12:45

I say, it's an interesting trip for Blinken to

12:47

be making at this time, both on dealing with

12:49

the epic global affairs like in the Middle East

12:51

and in Ukraine, but also regionally with two countries

12:54

that the US would like to consider partners, but

12:56

from very different perspectives right

12:58

now. So the Biden

13:00

administration has vowed to

13:02

punish Russia for the

13:04

death of Navalny. And

13:08

here Blinken is sitting in the room

13:11

with Lavrov at the G20. I

13:14

must say that the Russians are not

13:16

particularly isolated. I mean, they violated the

13:18

most fundamental rule of international law, which

13:21

is changing borders by force. I

13:23

mean, they gobbled up Crimea a decade

13:25

ago. They've invaded Ukraine. And

13:29

here he is sitting in the G20 meeting and

13:33

ain't nobody walking out. I mean, certainly

13:35

maybe Blinken will walk out, but is

13:38

the US more isolated than the Russians right

13:40

now because of its support for Israel and

13:42

Gaza? I know that sounds like one of

13:44

those just absolutely terrible false equivalency

13:46

questions until it happens. Yeah,

13:49

it's a very interesting point to raise. I wouldn't

13:51

say it's more isolated, but it certainly is finding

13:53

itself where it should be in the driver's seat

13:56

in terms of trying to drive a global narrative.

13:58

It's finding itself surprisingly facing. a

14:00

combative pushback with some countries aligned with

14:02

Russia. Some of it is realpolitik. Some

14:04

of it is countries that have clearly

14:06

benefited from ramped up trade, read China

14:08

and India. I believe there are Chinese

14:10

and Indian parties that might be facing

14:12

sanctions as part of some new sanctions

14:14

to be announced as well, by the

14:17

way. So that's going to be worth

14:19

watching to see whether the

14:21

expansive reach of the sanctions that Russia had

14:23

faced go further and go after the parties

14:25

that have been doing quite a bit of

14:28

business with Russia. And that

14:30

is definitely on display here. And again, this

14:32

meeting in Brazil, foreign minister meetings are usually

14:34

pro forma and are sort of setting the

14:36

stage for then a lot of Sherpa, so-called

14:38

Sherpa meetings before there's the actual summit. Brazil

14:40

will be hosting G20 summit in November, but

14:43

they came into this meeting deliberately setting the stage

14:45

with a few things, including stating there will be

14:48

no consensus document at the end of this meeting,

14:50

save that for the summit meeting. And even those

14:52

are tougher to come by now. They

14:54

want these officials to speak and speak candidly at

14:56

these high levels and see where they can find

14:58

common ground, because there are other things on the

15:01

agenda, like addressing issues like poverty

15:03

and climate change they would like to make

15:05

some traction on, but the oxygen seems to

15:07

be really consumed by the big issues and

15:09

the big power frictions that are

15:11

playing out from the chambers of the UN Security

15:13

Council in New York all the way down into

15:15

Rio these days. And the US is

15:17

going to go back to the UN with its own

15:20

Security Council resolution. And

15:23

even as we're speaking, Brett McGurk, the envoy

15:25

for the Middle East is over

15:27

in Israel trying to push Bibi Netanyahu

15:29

to move

15:31

forward with some sort of ceasefire deal.

15:34

And this resolution would call

15:36

for not going into

15:38

Rafa and moving forward with some sort

15:40

of a ceasefire, not the immediate one

15:42

that was in the resolution that they

15:44

vetoed. And potentially some sort of hostage

15:46

release. I think that some Israeli officials

15:48

have said that they're following that aspect

15:50

particularly closely. So things could be unfolding

15:52

even as this podcast drops, Carla, on

15:54

that front. So they may have something more to

15:56

sell in these meetings, but these

15:58

are difficult, difficult. meetings, and the

16:01

Russians seem to be riding disturbingly high

16:03

internationally right now. And certainly in the

16:05

wake of Navalny, one would

16:08

think that they would not be riding high. Yeah.

16:11

The only other thing to note on that front is

16:13

that you still are not seeing Vladimir Putin striding the

16:15

globe too much because countries that have

16:17

commitments to the ICC, for example, are

16:20

loath to drop those commitments, even South

16:22

Africa and Brazil. But

16:24

you still have a Russian foreign minister who's

16:26

walking in and speaking out freely. And

16:29

despite some of the revulsion that

16:31

was expressed after the events of the last week. So

16:34

Bob, let's pivot to Abu

16:36

Dhabi. This coming Monday, the

16:38

United Arab Emirates is going to

16:40

host the World Trade Organization's 13th

16:43

ministerial conference. And

16:45

these conferences cover trade, trade,

16:47

trade, fishery subsidies, e-commerce,

16:49

what do they do? Softwood lumber, one

16:52

of my particular favorites. But

16:54

the big question is whether they're going to

16:56

revive the appellate body. The

16:58

WTO was created to mediate international

17:01

trade disputes, but they have not been

17:03

doing that for quite a while. Because

17:06

since 2019, the US has refused to

17:08

have appointments of new judges to this

17:11

appeals body because they claim

17:13

that it's had huge judicial overreach. And

17:15

that was a Trump administration position,

17:17

and it remains a Biden administration

17:20

position. Are we going to

17:22

finally see a breakthrough in Abu Dhabi, some sort

17:24

of agreement on the appellate body reform

17:26

so the WTO can get back to doing what

17:28

it's supposed to do, which is adjudicate

17:30

trade disputes? And if it doesn't,

17:33

is the WTO going on a long

17:35

slide to irrelevance? A

17:37

lot to unpack there, but the short

17:39

answer is do not expect reform

17:42

to come out of this meeting. It's

17:44

safe to say most people who watched

17:46

WTO deliberations closely are saying the visions

17:48

are so deep that there's likely not

17:51

to be any serious negotiations conducted in

17:53

Abu Dhabi on whether

17:55

it's the appellate body reform or other

17:57

areas of reform. It's

18:00

down to matters of practicality, for example.

18:02

Our two colleagues, Inu Manak and Manjari

18:04

Miller, wrote an interesting post for CFR

18:07

in the last couple of weeks about just

18:10

urging the US to kind of go

18:12

to the mat to protect a form

18:14

of negotiation on this plurilateral discussions, which

18:16

allows smaller groups of WTO members to

18:18

try to at least have discussions, to

18:20

advance discussions on areas like fisheries, subsidies,

18:23

and agriculture, and e-commerce, and so forth,

18:25

before they go to the full group

18:27

of 164 countries, because

18:29

that formula of saying one country

18:31

is able to weigh in and

18:34

veto discussions or sideline discussions has

18:37

added to the incredible difficulty of

18:39

getting meaningful reform through. And even

18:41

on this plurilateral discussion front, you're

18:43

seeing pushback from India, which tends

18:45

to crop up repeatedly as a

18:48

spoiler, as well as South

18:50

Africa and Namibia. So even

18:52

on the sort of the format for discussions, we're

18:54

going to have to see how that works out.

18:57

Fisheries is a big deal. If they were

18:59

able to deal with fisheries alone, there would

19:01

be something people could come away with that

19:03

would be comforting, because there is widespread agreement

19:05

that the oceans are being overfished. I mean,

19:07

by some estimates, by 50% or 50% of

19:09

the oceans, I should say. And

19:13

the sustainable trade and growth is supposed to be

19:15

an underpinning of the WTO. And

19:17

also, we should note, by the way,

19:19

that despite all of the concern and

19:21

the consternation about reform, WTO rules still

19:23

cover something like 75% of world trade.

19:27

So these countries are still signing up to WTO. They're

19:29

still accepting new members. East Timor, I think, and Comoros

19:31

are going to join. But

19:33

for their work to be meaningful

19:35

in this age of real change

19:37

and potential huge transition in to

19:39

decarbonize energy sources, for example, and

19:41

all the tech discussions, this

19:43

body is not built for this moment.

19:45

So I think the HOSI UAE would

19:48

like to come away with some tangible

19:50

gains from this meeting. And

19:52

certainly WTO director and GOSI would like to.

19:55

But it's not clear from all of the signaling

19:57

coming up to this meeting. And this

19:59

is a meeting held every two years. years,

20:01

and global trade won't watch this closely, they

20:04

are saying this is looking pretty grim on

20:06

all the areas of reform. Let's

20:08

also notice an election year for a lot

20:10

of important countries that have trade issues. The

20:12

United States certainly among them. You

20:14

mentioned the US position on the appellate

20:16

body, but also on trade issues in

20:18

general has been problematic in terms of

20:21

ramping up subsidies for some homegrown industries.

20:23

Then India, which has its upcoming big

20:25

elections and it's dealing as we speak

20:27

with farmer protests over a whole host

20:29

of things, including pricing. I think all

20:33

of the things are rayed against it. It just feels like you're

20:35

not going to see anything major come out of these meetings, Carla.

20:40

Hi. I don't know what else you could say

20:42

at this point, other than that, as I said,

20:44

you have this confounding situation where you have many

20:46

of the people certainly in this meeting in Abu

20:48

Dhabi will acknowledge and will point

20:50

to the gains made by trade over the

20:52

past decades in terms of lifting billions with

20:54

a B of people out of poverty. Yet,

20:57

at this crunch moment layered on top of

21:00

these geopolitical tensions, which we've already talked about,

21:02

it seems to leave a little room for

21:04

some practical advancement. We talked about this at

21:06

the Munich Security Conference and their report

21:08

going into this. Lose, lose.

21:11

Yeah, exactly. This fracturing

21:13

of interest. There was

21:15

a time when the Republicans were pro-trade and the

21:17

Democrats were more worried because they were the party

21:20

of unions in the United States. There's nobody arguing

21:22

for trade and that seems to be going around

21:24

the world. You

21:28

just had the Teamsters announce they're going to be

21:30

giving a donation to the Republican Party, something you

21:32

haven't seen in decades. So it's a

21:34

changing world we're in. Carla, we've

21:36

talked ourselves into the audience figure of the

21:38

week. This

21:41

is the part of the podcast in

21:43

which the listeners vote every Tuesday and

21:45

Wednesday at CFR underscore org's Instagram story.

21:48

They picked this week the figure,

21:51

Nassar Hospital, as in WHO

21:53

reports, Gaza's Nassar Hospital not

21:55

functional. Why is the

21:57

fate of Nassar Hospital making the headlines, Carla?

22:00

It's really depressing this week. So

22:03

this is Gaza's second largest hospital,

22:05

and it is in southern Gaza

22:07

where a majority of the population has

22:09

fled. So the WHO's report

22:11

that it's no longer functional means that

22:13

the health system is one step

22:16

closer to complete collapse. And

22:19

reportedly, of Gaza's three dozen hospitals at

22:21

the start of this war, only 11

22:23

are still partially functional

22:26

and three are at minimal capacity.

22:29

So those stats are really, really concerning.

22:32

These really continue to insist that

22:34

Hamas leaders are hiding in and

22:36

under health facilities, and they've offered

22:38

only very limited evidence. But

22:41

the New York Times crunched a

22:43

video of a tunnel underneath al-Shifa

22:45

Hospital, which is Gaza's largest. You

22:48

remember the destruction there in the beginning. And

22:51

they crunched some other evidence, and they

22:53

found it persuasive enough to write that

22:55

it, quote, suggests Hamas used the hospital

22:58

for cover and stored weapons inside it

23:00

and maintained a hardened tunnel beneath the

23:02

complex. So

23:04

this is problematic, but it's

23:06

also violating all sorts of international

23:08

laws that you don't go after health facilities.

23:11

There's no question about the humanitarian

23:13

disaster that's been created by raids

23:15

on al-Shifa, on Qatari Hospital, on

23:17

the Kamal-Adwan Hospital, the Al-Rentisi Specialized

23:20

Hospital for Children, and now the

23:22

Nasser Hospital. Whether

23:24

it's a question of human shields, whether it's a

23:26

question of international law, what we know is that

23:28

there's almost no healthcare left in Gaza. And

23:32

the WHO said that after being denied

23:34

access to the Nasser Hospital, it did

23:37

manage to transfer two dozen critically ill

23:39

patients out of the complex, but in its

23:41

statement, it issued concern about another 130 patients,

23:44

which were still there, saying

23:46

that there is no electricity or running water.

23:48

Medical waste is piling up garbage. The Israelis

23:51

dispute that. They say their troops are delivering

23:53

aid and that the hospitals continue

23:55

to function. It's

23:57

very hard. You can't get reporters in there. We

24:00

don't know. What we do know

24:02

is that the system itself, when

24:04

you take the WHO, which you have to sort

24:06

of take their word, and they

24:09

say that the system across the board is close

24:11

to collapse. Yeah. And

24:13

it's on top of everything else. And

24:15

we mentioned previously that there does seem

24:17

to be diplomacy taking place in a

24:19

pretty stepped up manner right now about

24:21

at least a ceasefire and provisioning aid

24:23

into the area. But

24:25

the situation gets more

24:28

difficult, complicated, agonizingly tough

24:30

to sort out, and in part because of

24:32

the things that you mentioned in terms of

24:34

the entanglement in some cases of Hamas

24:37

in some of these areas. We had the

24:39

accusation, which I think has been borne out

24:41

in some cases of the UN's

24:43

Agency for Palestinians relief, UNRWA, having

24:45

some of its members, I think

24:47

12 of its members actually working

24:50

in concert with Hamas. Allegedly

24:52

participating, I think, in the October

24:54

7th attacks wasn't that the allegation?

24:56

Correct. That's the allegation, right.

24:58

And that immediately causes suspension of donations, including

25:00

the two main donors, which is the United

25:02

States and Germany. And so

25:05

that agency is under scrutiny. And

25:07

it's one thing after another. And it's

25:09

just, again, there are so many difficult

25:11

spots, but I think it's got to

25:13

start with provisioning some sort of safe

25:15

delivery of aid and trying

25:17

to then come up with some

25:19

sort of an off ramp as well. And

25:21

none of this is easy because the Israelis

25:23

are intent on eliminating Hamas and saying they

25:25

will not stop until that happens. And in

25:28

the middle of it, all there's hostages. And

25:30

the latest, you know, the Israelis seem

25:33

determined to go into Rafa, which where

25:35

the, at this point, the majority of the

25:37

population fled south because that was supposed

25:39

to be the safe place. Right. And

25:42

Benny Gantz, who's a member of Israel's

25:44

War Cabinet, who is at least

25:46

saying some positive things about the ceasefire

25:48

talks, which Netanyahu rejected

25:50

last week. He also warned on

25:53

Wednesday that Israel is going to

25:55

advance into Rafa even

25:57

during Ramadan. But he also said once

26:00

civilians there are evacuated, but we don't

26:02

see any plan for an evacuation. The

26:04

US has become more and

26:06

more outspoken, warning against what

26:09

would be a disaster about going into Rofa

26:11

itself. So it is a very,

26:14

you know, incredibly grim situation.

26:16

And these really say that they're putting aid

26:18

in, but nowhere near enough aid. I mean,

26:20

all the reports about the levels of malnutrition,

26:22

about the levels of disease. And

26:25

there was this very chilling

26:27

modeling by epidemiologists at the Johns

26:29

Hopkins University in the London School of Hygiene and

26:31

Tropical Medicine that I read about yesterday. I think

26:33

I read about it in the Times. And

26:37

these epidemiologists were predicting

26:39

that even with no change in the current

26:41

level of fighting or

26:43

humanitarian access, there could be an additional 58,000 Gazans

26:45

killed over the

26:47

next six months, in

26:49

addition to the 29,000 who've already

26:51

reportedly died. And

26:54

they said even with an immediate and sustained ceasefire

26:56

and no outbreak of major infectious

26:59

disease, another 6,500 could

27:01

die over that time period. You

27:03

know, this is just a terrible

27:05

situation on the ground,

27:07

and there really does need to be some resolution

27:10

to this. And

27:12

the country on the other side of the

27:14

Rofa border crossing, Egypt is not, again, is

27:16

not willing to be opening

27:18

up and accepting large streams of refugees. And

27:20

there's all sorts of understandable reasons for that,

27:23

but it just further compounds the difficulty there.

27:25

Well, I mean, their reasons for not wanting

27:27

it, you know, range from not wanting

27:30

to let Hamas into. They have their own

27:32

fears of terrorism, and their fear that the

27:34

Israelis would never let the Palestinians back

27:36

into Gaza. And when you listen to

27:38

what the Netanyahu government has been

27:40

saying about who will run Gaza

27:42

afterwards, that they're still rejecting a

27:45

two-state solution, they're still rejecting the

27:47

notion of a revamped PA running

27:49

Gaza itself. They don't want

27:51

to drain Gaza. There's a lot of diplomatic

27:53

work that needs to be done there. Right.

27:56

And we should say a revamped PA is a difficult

27:58

project in and of itself. There would be a

28:00

ton of support and then right now there's a

28:03

huge debate over the merits even of that. So

28:05

it's just so difficult. That's

28:08

our look at the world next week. Here's

28:11

some other stories to keep an eye on. Israel

28:13

will be holding local elections. The US and

28:15

Thailand host the Cobra Gold War Games in

28:17

the Gulf of Thailand and

28:19

Belarus holds quote unquote parliamentary

28:21

elections. Please

28:23

subscribe to the world next week on Apple

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28:30

leave us a review while you're at it.

28:33

We appreciate the feedback. If you'd like to

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reach out, please email us at TWNW at

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cfr.org. The publications mentioned

28:39

in this episode as well as a transcript

28:41

of our conversation are listed on the podcast

28:43

page for the world next week on cfr.org.

28:47

Please note that opinions expressed on the world next

28:49

week are solely those of the host not of

28:51

CFR which takes no institutional

28:53

positions on matters of policy. This

28:56

program was produced by Esther Fang and

28:59

Sina Douds, director of podcasting Gabriel Sierra.

29:02

A special thanks to our intern Olivia

29:04

Green for her research assistance. Our scene

29:06

music is provided by Marcus Zacharia. This

29:08

is Carla Robinson saying so long. And

29:10

this is Bob McMahon saying goodbye and

29:13

be careful out there.