Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning again, everyone. We'll talk now about this month of September as potentially being crucial in the already so tragic Middle East situation. An article in The Jerusalem Post this morning notes the annual UN General Assembly session scheduled for New York this month. In conjunction with that, it says significant Western capitals, Paris, London, Brussels, Ottawa, Canberra are preparing to recognize a Palestinian state. It describes Israel, in response, seriously debating again the annexation of parts of the West Bank, while it says the United Arab Emirates is warning that the Abraham Accords with Arab nations could unravel if annexation is approved. The article says, "Washington's position on annexation, well, that remains a bit of an unknown" from The Jerusalem Post.

All that, of course, is happening as hunger spreads in Gaza, as Israel pursues its takeover of Gaza City and is warning the million people there to leave, as Hamas continues to hold nearly 50 Israeli hostages, and as the Israeli public is becoming increasingly divided over whether war or a temporary ceasefire proposal that Hamas says it would accept is the best way to bring the hostages home. Let's try to understand as much as we can with Jane Arraf, NPR international correspondent covering the Middle East.

She was formerly The New York Times bureau chief in Baghdad, among other things, by way of background. She has reported a lot from Syria and Jordan this summer, as many have been hearing on NPR following the fall of the dictator Assad, but also very much about Israel and Gaza. She joins us today from Amman. Jane, thanks for giving us some time today for WNYC listeners in particular. Hello from New York.

Jane Arraf: Thank you for having me, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: Your latest story begins with a reference to Israel's military moving to displace the entire population of Gaza City. Can you explain briefly the plan and how much it is already happening to the extent that you know?

Jane Arraf: Absolutely. There's a lot happening on the ground. Israel says it has now operational control of 40% of Gaza City. What that clinical description means is that they have been moving in from the outskirts with airstrikes and other attacks, both targeting what they say are Hamas targets, but also trying to get people to leave because their plan is to seize all of Gaza City. This is the Gaza Strip's biggest city, and there are some something like 800,000 people living there. Now, a lot of them have been displaced at this point 14, 15 times some of them.

Many of them have lost family members. They have no money. Many don't even have tents, and a lot of them aren't moving. Those attacks are increasing, and that's essentially what's happening as Israel tries to move in, to force people essentially to go south. Now, the problem with going south is that although Israel says there will be tents there, there will be, there will be water, where they're asking them to go in many places is empty sand dunes or military zones where they could be killed and have been killed in some instances.

Brian Lehrer: Your article quotes the International Committee of the Red Cross, which says there is no safety, food, water, or shelter in places where Israel is wanting to go. You cite the World Health Organization saying 94% of the hospitals in Gaza have been destroyed and that there are no remaining hospitals in Rafah, that city you were just referring to near the Egyptian border, destroyed by Israel, as you write, where Israel says Palestinians being forced from Gaza City would be concentrated.

May I ask, how are people there in Rafah, or for that matter in Gaza anywhere, getting health care now from international groups or anyone else?

Jane Arraf: A lot of them aren't. The lucky ones who managed to survive these airstrikes, they are getting very minimal care. As you've seen, there's a lot of aid that's restricted by Israel. Israel says it's because of security concerns going into Gaza. They have no basic medical supplies. Some of the biggest groups operating there, such as Doctors Without Borders, say that they have trucks stuck with basic supplies for months. There are things that Israel determines that Israel classifies as possible dual use that it says could be used by Hamas.

Unfortunately, those are some of the things that are most desperately needed, things like anesthesia. Doctors there, foreign doctors and local doctors, are reporting doing things like amputations on children without anesthesia. They're basic sanitation equipment. Wounds are getting infected because there isn't any disinfectant. There's almost no clean water. What we've seen recently, as well, which we've written about and talked about, is that Israel has increasingly denied American doctors who have gone on volunteer missions at their own expense, taking leave.

These are specialists and very often people with experience in trauma zones, trying to go back a second or a third time and being rejected by Israel. That has also cut out the amount of medical expertise, given that Israel has killed so many medical staff. Gaza health Authorities say about 1,500 medical and rescue workers have been killed and that so many hospitals are either damaged or destroyed.

Brian Lehrer: A related story of yours from August 28th is called Israel increasingly bars foreign doctors who want to volunteer in Gaza. You cite the World Health Organization saying denial rates have increased by 50% since March. You may have just been touching on this, but what are the criteria that Israel uses? Why are more foreign doctors who just want to volunteer there being barred from entering?

Jane Arraf: That's the problem with a lot of this. Every time we talk about humanitarian aid going into Israel or medical missions, emergency medical teams, they all say there is no clear criteria. When we ask Israel about it, Israel says it communicates all of the criteria to these organizations. When I speak directly to them, the American organizations that are sending in doctors, they have people rejected, and they have no idea why. They're rejected at the very last moment.

One of the things I think we can surmise, because some of these organizations are saying that doctors who have been there before and have spoken about their experience are more likely to be rejected, is that it's also a way of cutting out witnesses to what's happening there. With all the killings of journalists, foreign doctors are some of the most credible remaining witnesses. Certainly, if you've been there before as a physician, as a surgeon, you're much more likely to be familiar with what's going on and to be able to talk about it knowledgeably and to make an assessment. That's one of the things we're losing with a lot of these medical staff being denied.

Brian Lehrer: You said no clear criteria for being accepted. You also report that the biggest looming threat is Israel's demand now that aid groups operating in Gaza re-register under new rules by next Tuesday, September 9th. Why do you call that the biggest looming threat? Maybe explain what some of these rules are, and if they close the vacuum a little bit, of there not being clear criteria.

Jane Arraf: Israel, because it controls all the borders in Gaza, it's responsible for anything coming in or out. All organizations that want to send trucks, want to send aid, want to send personnel into Gaza, have to be cleared by Israeli authorities. So far, most of the major groups are-- The registration has not been as clear cut, but now essentially the short version is Israel is imposing more conditions and more rules. The big thing that the aid organizations are rebelling against is that Israel is saying, "Give us all the personal data on your local and international staff and their family members."

These groups point out that they're not asked to do that by any government anywhere else in the world. Given that so many aid workers and so many health care workers have been targeted, for instance, in Israel, they believe that giving that information could lead to targeting their staff. There are a lot of big organizations that are refusing to do that. If Israel follows through on that threat and the groups follow through on not providing that information, Israel has been very clear it will shut down these organizations who make a huge difference, and they'll have to shut up shop and leave Gaza.

Brian Lehrer: My guest, if you're just joining us, is NPR international correspondent covering the Middle East, Jane Arraf, as we talk about some of what's going on there. We'll get to some of the international context as we go, with a number of countries recognizing or about to recognize a Palestinian state in the UN General Assembly session about to open here in New York shortly. There was an article this summer, and you just mentioned in one of your answers, Israel's concern about what I think you call dual use of aid by Hamas.

There was an article this summer in the conservative magazine National Review called Israel's Side of the Story, and it included this about aid. "There is real hardship in Gaza, but the situation on the ground is more complicated than Israel's critics make it out to be." The article acknowledges that food shortages on the Strip have proven more verifiable than they were previously.

It also says the current US and Israeli system, known as the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, or GHF, has "Deprived Hamas of a source of revenue and the means to extort the population, but it created bottlenecks," it says, "those choke points were exacerbated further by Hamas attacks near GHF distribution sites as it sought to scare locals away from a project that risked undermining its influence." From National Review. From what you know, Jane, is that accurate about some of Hamas's role in exacerbating the crisis? That side is also fighting a war.

Jane Arraf: That's what we've been hearing all along from Israel and from many US officials. The facts don't really bear that out. I'm saying that because, for instance, Reuters has obtained an internal US government document, an assessment by USAID, which, of course, now has been under attack by President Trump, saying that there was no proof of wide-scale diversion of humanitarian aid. Cindy McCain, who is head of the World Food Program, the biggest food aid provider in the world, has said the same thing.

No proof of widespread diversion by Hamas. There is definitely chaos. The limited amounts of food going in, the desperation for it has led to gangs. It's led to black marketeering. These aid groups are saying just flood the Gaza Strip with food, and that will go away because there won't be any incentive. Right now, the UN says that you need something like 600 trucks a day of food and medicine going in to basically make sure that people aren't starving and get as many people as possible healthy again. Israel says it allows in 300 to 400 trucks a day.

Unless you dig into it, it's not apparent that that figure also includes commercial trucks, which means you have to have money to buy food on the market, and most people don't. The system, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation is hugely important because it was an effort by Israel to sideline the UN, which had been doing distribution, which had done it for years. In its place, it installed a system of limited distribution points in places that are up to a six-hour walk away, meaning many people can't get to them.

A recent panel of famine experts found that those distribution points, the sole distribution for food, were open on average only 23 minutes per day. Essentially, the system that Israel is creating, it says, to deprive Hamas of the ability to steal aid, is also depriving people in Gaza of the ability to get food, according to most group.

Brian Lehrer: One more argument from that National Review article that's a follow-up to what you were just saying. It says, "Israel has now confessed that the GHF's efforts, substantial though they may be," I'm quoting from the article, "are insufficient to prevent the prospect of widespread malnutrition." It says Jerusalem relaxed its restrictions on aid distribution through UN-linked channels, but the aid did not move. It says, "As Israel claimed and proved via ample video evidence, thousands of tons of aid and 950 trucks sat idle on the Israeli side of the Gaza border, even as the Netanyahu government urged the UN to act."

They say it was because the UN wanted Israel to lower its security standards for what gets in. The article asks, "How could they accuse Israel of causing famine in Gaza while simultaneously leaving the aid trucks to sit there without distributing the food?" Again, unquote from the National Review. How would the UN or aid groups respond to that critique?

Jane Arraf: That makes it sound as if here are these aid trucks at the border and they don't want to comply with Israeli security requirements, which is not the case. Israel has very strict security requirements. These groups say they comply with all of them, even though they're often, they say, arbitrary. One truck that could be rejected for having an operating table, for instance, which is a real example, could be allowed through the next day with no change in the cargo.

Because of those restrictions, because of what the group say is the ever changing nature of what's allowed in and what is not allowed in because of new rules that Israel has implemented, including customs fees on transit of aid trucks through Israel, military escorts on roads used by NGOs, non governmental organizations going through Israel, it has become a lot harder to get trucks through. There are indeed, according to everyone involved in this process, hundreds of trucks at that border, some of them with food going bad, some of them with medicine about to expire.

It does not seem to be the case that the problem is that the UN or other groups will not comply with Israeli security protocols. Again, those protocols are very strict. Those doctors we talked about, the foreign doctors going in, American doctors and others, when they go in, they're not allowed to take any medication, they're not allowed to take baby formula. They're told that's a security issue for Israel. They're allowed a very limited amount of money.

When patients come out of Gaza, the ones who are lucky enough to get permission to be evacuated for medical treatment in other countries, they're not allowed to take anything except the clothes on their backs. This is a very, very restrictive system. Israel, of course, argues that it's needed for security purposes, but it doesn't explain why, for instance, that means they're taking baby formula away from doctors who want to bring it to hospitals.

Brian Lehrer: To that point, kind of, there's a statement this morning in The Jerusalem Post from Israel's Defense Minister, Israel Katz, who said, I guess just today about Gaza City, that the military activity there, "Will intensify until the Hamas murderers and rapists accept Israel's conditions to end the war, foremost among them the release of all the hostages and disarmament, or they will be destroyed." From Israel's Defense Minister. Do you have a sense of what the actual Hamas military targets in Gaza are versus how much the displacement itself is the goal, as many critics assert?

Jane Arraf: If you look at the statements by senior Israeli officials, and you've just mentioned one of them, Brian, the goal is definitely to empty Gaza City of all of its population. Further than that, Israeli officials, some senior officials, have also been very clear that their ultimate goal is to get rid of Palestinians in Gaza, to send them to Egypt, to send them to Jordan, to send them to places like Libya, for instance. When we talk about this conflict and people say it's complicated, it is and it isn't, right?

The fact that 64,000 civilians, half of them women and children, have now been killed in this war in two years, that isn't complicated. What is complicated is the whole dynamic of Israel trying to ensure its security with a growing polarization, it seems, in Israel. There are many Israelis who want the hostages back, and then they want the war to stop. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has made clear that he wants to go further than that.

He wants the hostages back, of course, but then he wants to completely destroy Hamas, which means, it seems, from what we're seeing on the ground and from Israeli military statements, which means emptying Gaza City of people and basically flattening it the way they did with Rafah.

Brian Lehrer: Here's a skeptical text from a listener talking about flattening places. It says, "Hamas can end this ugly war that they started today, return the hostages, and surrender." Let's be clear. This listener writes, "This is war, and innocent people die in wars, especially since Hamas uses them as shields. How much aid did we allow into Japan during World War II? How many innocent people died when we dropped two atomic bombs?" I guess the implication of that question is, as long as Hamas is promising to keep fighting, what do you expect?

Jane Arraf: The thing is that Hamas agreed with Arab negotiators to a plan that was very similar to a plan that Israel had accepted a while back. It was to return the hostages in return for some Palestinians--

Brian Lehrer: Some of the hostages. Right?

Jane Arraf: A phased return of the hostages, but they were eventually looking at all the hostages in return for some of the Palestinian prisoners and a ceasefire. The Israeli government has not responded to that. It said recently that it saw that the Hamas acceptance of that proposal as what it called spin. Essentially, there's been a stalemate, and it's because there are no negotiations going on. All questions are valid questions. When someone asks, "Why doesn't Hamas stop this?" It does imply, though, that Hamas controls everything in Gaza, which it doesn't.

Gaza is 2 million people. Having them give up the hostages, okay, they give up the hostages, and then surrender, as the person said. What does surrender mean? Where does that put the 2 million, most of them civilians, in Gaza? It leaves them vulnerable to being either expelled from their homes again or coming under more danger. It doesn't end things. I think most people agree that the way to end this is a negotiated settlement, that there is no way to end it on the ground because Israel hasn't been able to end it so far. It's been almost two years.

Brian Lehrer: We have a few minutes left with NPR international correspondent covering the Middle East, Jane Arraf. You hear her on Morning Edition and All Things Considered. She joins us today from Amman. I'd like to use our remaining time, Jane, to ask about some of the current international context. One of your recent articles is called Syria may be warming up to Israel after fall of Assad regime.

You cite surprising changes, as you put it, including, of all things, that after decades of Syria being one of Israel's most bitter enemies, that it now has an Islamist government that might be warming to Israel. An Islamist government that might be warming to Israel. Why would an Islamist government, of all things, be warming to Israel and the way the Muslim world and the Middle East and so much of the world sees what's going on now?

Jane Arraf: I guess the background to that is that not all Islamic countries are anti-Israel. We've seen that with the normalization accords with the United Arab Emirates, for instance, and-- [crosstalk]

Brian Lehrer: There's a difference, if you're using the word Islamist and correct me if I'm wrong, there's a difference between Islamic, which just means most of the people are Muslim, and Islamist, which is a political ideology associated with Al Qaeda and groups like that

Jane Arraf: Well-known apolitical ideology, yes, but no, not associated with Al Qaeda. For instance, Islamic Gulf countries are run by Islamic law. That is their main source of legislation in some countries. Let's talk about Syria. The president and the group that he led to depose the former dictator, Bashar al-Assad, are indeed former Islamist fighters. They're militants. He was at one point affiliated with Al Qaeda. He says he has now renounced that. We've seen that President Trump is among those who believe he's renounced him because he's renounced that, because he's welcomed his taking over Syria.

The question that you were asking is, why would they now warm up to Israel? It's really simple, I found when I talked to people, and I was a bit surprised at this as well, because Syria for a long, long time had been associated with the Palestinian armed resistance. People there have had enough of war. They've had enough of conflict. They really want peace. That doesn't mean that they don't also want to see a Palestinian state. What they want most of all is not to be a war war with anyone, to be able to rebuild their economy.

If the way to do that, according to most people, as far as I've seen, is to forge an agreement or warm up relations with Israel, they will do that to a certain extent. Right now, Israel is continuing to launch airstrikes close to Damascus near the Golan Heights. It sent soldiers across the border. That's really a deterrent to any relationship between Syria and Israel. It does seem that the Syrian president is intent on getting there.

Brian Lehrer: I mentioned earlier The Jerusalem Post article this morning that cites this month of September as being potentially very consequential. It said significant Western capitals, Paris, London, Brussels, Ottawa, Canberra are preparing to recognize a Palestinian state. It says Jerusalem, in response, is again seriously debating West Bank annexation. We all know this is happening as the annual UN General Assembly meeting is coming to New York this month, where there might be discussion by people from those capitals, those countries about recognizing a Palestinian state.

The article said, "Washington's position on annexation, well, that remains a bit of an unknown." Do you have anything on, and I realize you're reporting there, not in Washington, but do you have anything on if Trump has any kind of position or influence on Israel's possible plan to annex parts of the West Bank, not just occupy it?

Jane Arraf: He definitely has influence. He has a lot of influence on anything that Israel does. He has not been exerting that influence lately to the extent that he could. Regarding the West Bank and annexation, he has not made clear how he sees that, as far as I know. That does seem to be a red line among many US allies. It's not just against international law. It would be extremely destabilizing. Saudi Arabia, for instance. One thing Trump wants, really wants, is for Saudi Arabia to make peace with Israel.

Saudi Arabia has made clear that there has to be progress on the Palestinian issue for any normalization of ties. The United Arab Emirates has made clear that there can be no annexation of the West Bank if it's going to continue a relationship with Israel. Israel's neighbors, Jordan and Egypt. Jordan is extremely alarmed at a talk of annexation because the follow-on to annexation is pushing more palest into Jordan. It wouldn't just be an action to annex the West Bank. It would be something that would affect the entire Middle East. One thinks that that's a factor that would be taken into account.

Brian Lehrer: What do people say the effect of those countries recognizing Palestine could be? NPR this morning had, maybe you heard it, former Israeli negotiator Daniel Levy, now a critic of his government in many ways, being skeptical. Here's a clip from Levy on Morning Edition today.

Daniel Levy: I think the crucial question here is whether recognition itself matters very much. What Israel constantly is doing is testing what it can get away with. There is a letter of condemnation, notably as one would expect, I think not signed by the US but signed by 22 countries plus the EU. The Israeli government looks at all the ink that's been spilled on paper, and they say, "Okay, are they still trading with us? Yes. Are our assets being frozen when they're held in overseas bank accounts? No, they're not. Do we still have visa-free travel to these countries? Yes, we do."

Brian Lehrer: Former Israeli negotiator Daniel Levy on Morning Edition today. Jane, if Levy, as a former Israeli official, argues, recognition without those other kinds of pressures are meaningless. That's his implication. Do others argue it could mean more than that?

Jane Arraf: That is such a great point that he makes. Many people and many governments, including those who desperately want to see a Palestinian state, believe that it's great that a message is being sent, but that in some cases, perhaps a declaration that countries are prepared to recognize a Palestinian state is in actual fact a substitute for taking actions that could affect this war and that could protect Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank and foster conditions that could lead to a Palestinian state.

What it has done, though, according to many people I talk to, is change the narrative a bit. There's a feeling that maybe now Palestinians and the Arab world are able to get the message across that this is a culture, this is a society, these are people with a homeland, and it's not just some abstract conflict. We're seeing that in films. We're seeing that in increasing protests in Europe, for instance. A lot of people are taking heart in that in the same way that they take heart in countries saying that they will recognize a Palestinian state, but at the same time don't think that that's the ultimate way they're going to achieve one.

Brian Lehrer: Recognizing a state of Palestine suggests a two-state solution could still be a solution. Netanyahu is trying to prevent that. I think it's fair to say Hamas doesn't want that either in the long run. That's where the possible annexation of West Bank areas comes in, I guess, that Israel is considering it makes a two-state solution even harder. Since Israel already occupies the West Bank, what would annexation actually change?

Jane Arraf: That's a great question. It would certainly allow more settlements. Right now, we're seeing increasing settlements and increasing attacks on Palestinians and Palestinian villages in the West Bank. There were something like 1,000 attacks recorded over the past year or so by Israeli settlers. That's a really big problem both there and here, for instance. When Jordan sends aid to Gaza, Israeli settlers try to block the trucks because they don't want aid going there.

Israeli security forces, in most cases, don't really do anything to deter these attacks. If it were annexed, they would certainly have much more leeway to move into Palestinian homes, to cut off water, to destroy Palestinian-owned forests, and it would be an irreversible step.

Brian Lehrer: Before you go, as The New York Times noted recently, Israel has barred international journalists from freely entering Gaza to cover the war. It cites the Committee to Protect Journalists, counting 190 media workers, the great majority of them Palestinian, who have been killed since the war began in 2023. My question is, with international journalists being barred, how do you get reliable information from a war zone where the warring sides want to control what the world sees as much as they do?

Jane Arraf: That's a great question and a really worrying question. We are fortunate to have an extremely talented, extremely brave producer, reporter Anas Baba, still in Gaza. He's one of the few left who are working for Western news organizations there. As you mentioned, so many of them have been killed. Let me give you a small example. Today, for instance, there's a video taken by Gaza Defense Forces who were called to the scene of a bus-- a minibus, it looked like-- that had been hit in an Israeli airstrike.

When they got there, they found the bodies of children. You can see a lot in this quite graphic video. It turns out that it was a bus full of women and children. This is the sort of thing where if we were covering wars in other places, there would be reporters who would be out with security forces, who would be out with civil defense rescue workers, first responders, and the reporters would be able to report on that. Because there's so few Gaza reporters left, although the ones that are there are taking risks every day to get news out, we are not getting as much news.

Because there are no foreign reporters there, that makes it even more difficult, because if a network, for instance, is going to invest in sending its own correspondent to Gaza, it's going to get a lot of airtime in the way that reports from a local reporter would not. One of the things has been that Israel clearly does not want people to see what's going on there. Both because it has been killing local journalists, it has barred foreign journalists, and it has been an unprecedentedly dangerous place to work for journalists. It means that a lot of that news isn't getting out.

Brian Lehrer: NPR Middle East correspondent Jane Araff, thank you very much for joining us and talking about so many of these issues.

Jane Arraf: Thank you, Brian.

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