"Complete Charade": Qatar Withdraws from Ceasefire Talks, Middle East Prepares for Trump Presidency

this is democracy Now democracynow.org War peace and the presidency I'm Amy Goodman we continue to look at Gaza where Israeli forces launched a deadly attack early Sunday morning on a residential area in jabalia where displaced Palestinians were attempting to shelter killing at least 36 people including over a dozen children dozens of the victims were reportedly members of the same family asleep when Israeli forces attacked their home an eyewitness who lost several relatives describe the horrific scene we were just sitting peacefully these are innocent citizens who don't belong to any military organization or faction the eldest

man is 70 years old the house of Abu Alo Ali Alo was bombed over the resident's heads without warning which led to the martyrdom of everyone inside more than 30 Martyrs those who were lucky enough to survive were thrown onto the trees onto the neighbors and the remains are still scattered under the rubble Palestinian journalist Muhammad was killed along with his wife after an Israeli air strike on their tent in the new sedat refugee camp at least three more gazen journalists were also killed in the Israeli strikes over the weekend the attacks happened as the

people of Gaza marked over 400 Days since Israel launched its latest war and as Northern Gaza remains under a brutal Siege with hospitals surrounded by Israeli forces who've issued forced evacuation orders but doctors and medical staff have refused to leave their patients behind behind amidst Israel's Relentless attacks the Palestine red crescent Society helped evacuate some 20 patients from Ala Hospital in jabalia and transferred them to alifa hospital in Gaza City brcs reported at least one of the patients died as the ambulances were held up for hours at an Israeli checkpoint meanwhile the UN backed famine

Review Committee has joined other humanitarian groups and issuing a dire warning that there is a quote strong likelihood that famine is IM in areas of Northern Gaza this all comes as cutter suspended its efforts to mediate a Gaza ceasefire and hostage release deal until they say Israel and Hamas show quote willingness and seriousness to resume negotiations Israel also carried out deadly strikes on Lebanon and Syria over the weekend while the United States bomb Yemen over the past two nights for more we go to the hag where we're joined by muen Rabani Dutch Palestinian Middle East

analyst um host of the connections podcast he's former senior analyst for the international crisis group and a contributor to the book Deluge Gaza and Israel from crisis to catalis Moen welcome back to democracy now in a minute we're going to ask you about the latest in Amsterdam where police beat and arrested more than a hundred Pro Palestinian protesters Sunday after they defied a ban on demonstrations following Street clashes uh between visiting Israeli soccer fans and Dutch youth but first can you talk about the significance of cutter temporarily withdrawing as a mediator between Israel and Hamas

for the Gaza ceasefire talks and about what's happening currently in Riad yes well turning to qar first um several days ago there were press reports that Qatar was going to as you mentioned suspend its mediation and also so uh the Hamas Exile leadership that has been based in Qatar the door and ask them to leave the country in response to us pressure uh the expulsion of the Hamas leaders has been denied by Kat but it has indeed as you mentioned confirmed that it is suspending its um uh that it is suspending its mediation saying basically

that the parties aren't serious and I think my own View was that this is something that gatar and the other mediator Egypt as well should have done months ago when it became entirely apparent that there never were serious ceasefire negotiations and that this process was essentially serving as a fig leaf for Israel and for the United States to continue with their war of annihilation in the Gaza Strip and deflect criticism by um claiming that they're involved in Earnest initiatives to try try to put an end to this war as as many of your listeners and

viewers will know every time there appears to be progress uh the Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu shifts the goal posts and we're back to square one and then Anthony blinkin is Trot it out to say that Hamas is the obstacle so I think it's a good thing that these um at least that gatar has suspended its efforts and hopefully Egypt will do so soon as well because this entire process has from the outset been a complete charade so talk about what's happening right now in Riad somewhat 60 world leaders including the Syrian president Assad um including

Eran and others uh the Turkish president are in Saudi Arabia right now talk about the significance of this and then um what this means in after the election of Donald Trump well this is the second such Summit the first was held if I'm not mistaken in late November or early December last year it was supposed to be an emergency Arab League Summit but the um Saudi de facto leader Crown Prince Muhammad bin senman then expanded it to also include the organization of Islamic cooperation many people felt that was an attempt to seek to dilute the

decisions um that would be reached by this enlarged conference and indeed the only um relevant resolution that they adopted was that they would immediately begin providing humanitarian supplies to the Gaza Strip irrespective of is any Israeli restrictions and in fact they did absolutely nothing and delivered nothing nothing unless they had Israeli approval to do so um this is now if you will a follow-up um uh Summit it's possible that this one could be more serious because there is as you know a very significant risk now of an allout war that would include um uh Israel

and Iran trading blows directly at each other and I think Saudi Arabia and other Gulf cooperation Council states are very much worried about being in the front line of any such conflict and being uh left with the consequences in terms of attacks on their own oil facilities and territory and so on I me these are countries that had formerly looked to Israel as a reliable or potentially reliable security partner but now seeing Israeli government determined to set the entire region of flame and they want to ensure that they're not consumed by those Flames so where

does Trump fit into this picture well known to be extremely close as his son uh son-in-law um uh is also extremely close to uh the Saudi Arabian Prince uh Salon yes well as as you mentioned the the relationship between the Saudi Crown Prince um uh Muhammad bin Salman and the American Crown Prince Prince Jared of Kushner is known to be very close it's less clear what a second Trump Administration will mean for the region um will it be a continuation of Biden's policies towards the region which were very much a continuation of the first Trump's

Administration A's uh policies towards the region Will trump um intensify hard as that may be to believe uh us support for Israel and sign off on open Warfare against Iran or will he also respond to those isolationist and anti-war elements among his constituency and seek to ensure that the US is not drawn directly into an armed conflict in the Middle East which would also mean um using some leverage on Israel not to escalate um matters further the problem with Trump is that he he is so erratic and we still don't know who he's going to

surround himself with that it's uh very difficult to speculate about what the first months of a second Trump Administration are going to bring he's already for example indicated that Mike Pompeo and Nikki Haley uh two well-known middle east talks uh will not be part of his administration but against that he's also um uh been closely working with Brian hook a well-known Iran Hawk and has um indicated that his new ambassador to the United Nations will be um uh Congressman congresswoman stefanic who is also well known for her very very radical positions with respect to the

region