Global News Podcast - Israel casts doubt on whether it will accept a new ceasefire proposal

Episode Date: August 19, 2025

Israel is demanding the release of all 50 hostages held in Gaza, an Israeli official has said, casting doubt on whether it will accept a new proposal for a 60-day ceasefire that Hamas agreed to on Monday. Also: President Trump has ruled out sending American troops to Ukraine as part of any peacekeeping deal; Mumbai is under a red flood alert as the Indian city experiences heavy downpours; 10 years after 71 people were found in an abandoned lorry in Austria, we hear from the families of the victims; child marriages are more likely to happen in regions with higher than average climate risk according to new figures; India tells China of its concerns about a new mega dam; mixed doubles tennis has a new format at the US Open; thousands of people in France sign a petition not to loan the Bayeux Tapestry to the UK. The Global News Podcast brings you the breaking news you need to hear, as it happens. Listen for the latest headlines and current affairs from around the world. Politics, economics, climate, business, technology, health – we cover it all with expert analysis and insight. Get the news that matters, delivered twice a day on weekdays and daily at weekends, plus special bonus episodes reacting to urgent breaking stories. Follow or subscribe now and never miss a moment. Get in touch: [e-mail]

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And don't miss the new season of Karen Piri coming this October. You don't look, look, please. I'll do that as a compliment. See it differently when you stream the best of British TV with Britbox. Watch with a free trial today. This is the Global News podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Julia McFarlane and in the early hours of Wednesday, 20th of August, these are our main stories. Israel casts doubt on whether it will accept a new ceasefire proposal.

Trump rules out U.S. boots on the ground in Ukraine but says Putin will face a rough situation if he doesn't cooperate. Also in this podcast, 10 years after 6. 71 people died in an unventilated truck abandoned in Austria, we hear from their families. Imagining, like, putting a lot of people in one truck and no air, it's just like a disaster. All of that was because of money. Over the past few days, we've focused on peace efforts in Ukraine. But behind closed doors, there have also been strenuous negotiations to, towards ending the fighting in Gaza.

On Monday, Hamas told the BBC it had accepted a proposal by Arab mediators involving a 60-day truce and the release of half of the hostages. On Tuesday, an official in Prime Minister Netanyahu's office has told the BBC they would only agree to a ceasefire if all 50 remaining hostages, dead and alive, are released. The latest proposals were part of a last-ditch effort by Qatar and Egypt to secure a ceasefire and a hostage release agreement to potentially avoid a major Israeli offensive

to fully occupy Gaza. David Mensa is spokesman for the Israeli government. The Prime Minister has laid out a plan for the future of Gaza. And that means our ambitions are no more, no more partial plans, no more dancing to the Hamas tune. We want all of our hostages back. We're not interested in partial deals. Our principle now is extremely clear.

All the hostages must be released immediately. I asked our correspondent in Jerusalem, Emir Nader, if progress could still be made. It's certainly dashing hopes. This isn't, as you've mentioned, the formal response by Israel to Hamas's agreement to that proposal. But it does seem quite strong, the language that we're hearing from Israeli government officials. it does indeed look like they may reject the proposal that Hamas has signed up to or at least try to substantially renegotiate it. And for many it is a surprise because this is a deal,

the basis of which was essentially being negotiated upon as recently as last month. However, others have also pointed out this hardening of language from the government in recent days. And we heard just in the past few days, Prime Minister Netanyahu talking about no more partial deals and that Israel was pushing for the full release of Israeli hostages. We obviously don't know if this is part of a negotiating

tactic as well and we also don't know when an official Israeli response might come but the deal as we understand it did include some softening of Hamas's position and so there were some hopes that it would receive a positive response

in Israel that doesn't look to be the case. We've heard from a White House briefing that the United States continues to discuss that ceasefire proposal for Gaza that Hamas has accepted. Can you tell us more about what we believe is in those proposals? So we understand from sources who are close to the talks, close to the negotiation, the discussions happening in Egypt, that it is essentially the same deal that was originally drafted by the US envoy, Steve Wickoff. It would have involved an initial 60-day ceasefire period in which half of the hostages that are in Gaza would be released.

That includes living and those who aren't the dead hostages, the bodies that remain there. It would see prisoners being released from Israeli prisons going back to Gaza. It would see Israeli troops withdraw from parts of the Gaza Strip to awards a buffer zone. And there had been some softening, it seemed like, of Hamas' position on those points. And now, if we are to understand the messaging from these officials close to the Prime Minister, it looks like those concessions aren't enough for the Israeli side and they'll push for a full release of Israeli hostages. Emir Nader.

President Trump has ruled out sending American troops to Ukraine as part of any peacekeeping deal. In his first interview since talks at the White House with President Zelensky, Mr Trump told the Fox News program, Fox and Friends, that he had hopes that Vladimir Putin would move forward with plans to end the war. But he acknowledged it was possible the Russian president didn't want to make a deal. He also repeated that Kiev would not join NATO. After confirming

US troops would not be sent to Ukraine, Mr. Trump insisted that major European powers would step up instead. We've got the European nations and they'll front-load it and they'll have some of them, France and Germany, UK. They want to have boots on the ground. I don't think it's going to be a problem, to be honest with you. I think Putin is tired of it. I think they're all tired of But you never know. We're going to find out about President Putin in the next couple of weeks. That I can tell you. Our North America correspondent, Arunaday Mukherjee, gave us this update. At the moment, from what we've gathered in terms of statements from various leaders who were part of those conversations yesterday

and Donald Trump himself by way of that interview and the brief clip that you played out, is that the focus and the thrust seems to largely be on two aspects. One, to try and get that bilateral meeting done between the... the two leaders of the warring countries of Ukraine and Russia. We still don't have a timeline of that, which I think is very critical. We're waiting to get more details about what exactly will be the plan, the structure, because only after that can there be a possibility of a trilateral. And the second aspect that remains the focus at the moment in conversations

would be the attempts by the U.S. along with their allies to try and work out those security guarantees, which they feel will be critical for Ukraine going forward. for Ukraine security. Now, the obvious part is, which we've heard from the European leaders, is Europe is likely to have, you know, the ability to deploy troops on the ground, although that the modalities of all of that are still being worked out. But I think the newslines that came out of President Trump were important that he's completely ruling out boots on the ground for the US, but talking about support and also indicating at one point that

it could be air support. Now, we still don't know what exactly that means, whether that means surveillance, combat, you know, intelligence, we still don't know. But essentially saying that there will be some form of U.S. presence, but I think all of that is being worked out, as Caroline Levitt, who was holding a briefing, said that options are on the table, but this is something that is still work in progress and it's being worked out. Did we learn anything new from that press briefing from Caroline Levitt? Well, just reiteration of what we've heard from President Trump, there were a lot of questions, you know, that revolved around what many feel to be confusion about the meetings that President

Trump is trying to have with President Putin, but there have been no firm details revealed about that, which, you know, is something that we are still waiting for. Arunaday Mukherjee. Well, no reaction so far from President Putin himself about all of this, but one of his advisors, the former Deputy Foreign Minister Andro Fedorov, told the BBC that Monday's meeting between Donald Trump, Volodymy Zelensky and other European leaders was significant for Moscow. was a clear demonstration that transatlantic unity is still existing. There were a lot of hopes in Moscow that it will be not so, but it has happened. Now we can see a kind of roadmap for

the further developments. Now we are standing on even more serious period of talks, negotiations, because after yesterday's meeting in Washington, there are no way to step back. So what's next then? Is a peace agreement even possible? Earlier, I spoke to our diplomatic correspondent Paul Adams. I asked him what the Ukrainians are likely to want to achieve from further diplomatic talks. First of all, an end to the fighting and then some guarantees that Russia will not attack again in the future. And that is not a simple matter at all. That's going to involve not just pieces of paper, but all kinds of ways in which Ukraine's long-term security is guaranteed through the provision of Western military equipment,

the presence in Ukraine of supporting elements from the so-called coalition of the willing to a whole host of issues. And then, of course, there is the question of territory. And I think the Ukrainians know perfectly well that painful sacrifices are looming, that some of the territory that Russia has taken over in the past 11 years, starting with Crimea in 2014, is very, very unlikely ever to be returned. So what you tend to hear Ukrainian officials talking about is, Well, we're not going to legally recognize Russia's conquest of any of our sovereign territory. We will cling to that principle ferociously. But there are examples of other conflicts around the world,

frozen conflicts in which territorial status was put to one side, and people just sort of got on. And I suppose that is sort of what Ukraine is hoping for, that no one is going to be persuaded to legally recognize Russia's occupation of say the Donbass. Well, on that, we also heard Fedorov admit that if Putin were to conquer the remaining parts of Dynetsk, it may take him several years. And so is there an issue that actually Putin is not just playing for time, but hoping to get

something out of these talks that he cannot achieve on the battlefield? Oh, absolutely. I mean, we're talking about the last 25% or so of the Donetsk Oblast, and this area known as the fortified belt or the fortress belt, a serious. of cities, including Kramatosk and Sloviansk, which have been essentially the front line for the last 11 years. For all sorts of military strategic reasons, the Russians would dearly like to get behind that fortress line. And for all sorts of military reasons, Ukraine wants to stop that happening, because it would leave other parts of Ukraine to the north and the west vulnerable should Russia decide to attack

again in the future. And so there will be a lot of attention given to that little chunk of territory. And Paul, lastly, do you think all the recent developments take us any closer to that Putin Zelensky face-off? I mean, in one sense, yes, they do, because everyone is now talking about it, and the ground that needs to be prepared before it happens is now starting to be covered.

But, you know, I don't think anyone should get ahead of themselves here. There is an awful lot of stuff that has to be sorted out. territorial discussions, all the discussions about security guarantees before a meeting of Vladimir Putin and Vladimir Zelensky can really take place. That's the sort of event that you can imagine capping a process rather than coming in the middle of a process. Paul Adams. Ten years ago this week, a refrigerated truck was found abandoned on a motorway in Austria.

The doors were wired shut, the air was turned off and there were no vents. Inside, police found the bodies of 59 men, eight women and four children. Our Central Europe correspondent Nick Thorpe has been talking to relatives of some of the victims. I've travelled to the town of Hanke in Iraqi Kurdistan to meet the family of some of those who died in the truck. Hazem Kali and his wife Gourier lost their daughter, Elin, aged 14. son Allend, aged 16, and Hazem's younger brother, Herish. This was the last picture he took with the family. It was on 5 August 2050, and the place is the border between Turkey and Iraq.

So this was the last time he saw them. France is a prison in Bulgaria, a forbidding fortress of a building at the foot of the Balkan mountains. Metrodi Georgiev, 39 years old, sits opposite me. He was sentenced to life without the possibility of parole as one of the leaders of the smuggling gang who organized that truck. How did you feel towards all those people you were moving? The first time you feel sorry for them, but after the fifth you don't. These people are prepared to get into trucks without even asking. No one's forcing them to do it. They're prepared to die on the road rather than go back to the countries they came from.

By August 2015, thousands of asylum seekers a day were crossing the Serbian border into Hungary. From there, gangs like this one drove them on to Germany. The 71 migrants were squeezed into the back of that particular truck just before dawn. Soon after it set out, they started banging and shouting. The driver got worried and rang Metoddy. And Metoddy rang the boss, an Afghan called, called Samsor to ask what to do. Keep driving, he said, and if they die, dump the bodies in the forest.

We know all this detail because the Hungarian police were tapping their phones. This evidence was so damning, the judge passed down the maximum sentences. But Metodi still proclaims his innocence. To this day, I don't feel guilty. Everyone makes mistakes, right? I regret what I've done. I also have a family. I'm not a monster.

To kill these people deliberately, I didn't kill anyone. Back in northern Iraq, we sat on cushions on the floor of Hazem's tidy home. Hazem feels justice has been done. He's saying this one who did this thing, they are not humans. because imagining, like, putting a lot of people in one truck and no air, it's just like a disaster.

It's saying all of that was because of money to get more money. So let's leave it for God on the European governments to give them what they deserve. Hassam Kali finishing that dispatch, and you can listen to Nick Thorpe's full report, the truck that shocked the world on the BBC World Service, as a podcast wherever you get your BBC podcasts. Still to come in this podcast, an art historian in France wants to stop the loan of the Bayo Tapestry to the UK. We compare often with La Joconde, Mona Lisa, with paintings by Grandmasters.

But paintings by Grandmasters are many. There is only one tapiscript by you. This podcast is brought to you by Wise, the app for international people using money around the globe. With Wise, you can send, spend and receive up to 40 currencies with only a few simple taps. Plus, Wise won't add hidden fees to your transfer. Whether you're buying souvenirs with pesos in Puerto Vallata or sending euros to a loved one in Paris, you know you're getting a fair exchange rate with no extra markups. Be smart. Join the 15 million customers who choose Wise.

Download the Wise app today or visit Wise.com. apply. Who's abducting 100,000 children in China each year? And how was a cult where paedophilia, murder and torture were commonplace, allowed to operate in Chile for nearly four decades? At True Crime Reports, a new video podcast from Al Jazeera, we'll investigate these stories from the global south and beyond. True crimes that often haven't reached the headlines in the West. I'm Hallamohydine. In each episode, we'll take you to a different country. You'll hear from experts and first-hand accounts from those right at the heart of these stories. True Crime Reports. Find us under Al Jazeera's YouTube channel podcast tab and wherever you get your podcasts.

Weather forecasters have issued a red alert for Mumbai as the Indian city experiences heavy downpours and flooding. The authorities have urged residents to take care as further rainfall is expected, along with high tides. More than 20 centimetres of rain have fallen in the city in the past 24 hours, the highest volume in one day since 2020. Our South Asia correspondent, Yogita Lamaay, reports from Mumbai. Life has been thrown out of gear in Mumbai after two days of heavy rainfall. Government offices were closed and the private sector was told to allow its employees to work from home. A holiday was also declared for schools and colleges. There was flooding in several parts of the city

with videos of half-submerged vehicles being shared on social media. The Mithee River, which runs through the city, came dangerously close to breaching its banks, so hundreds of people living close to it were evacuated and are being sheltered in schools. At railway platforms, passengers were told that trains were suspended because of flooding on the tracks,

but rail services have now started to resume. While the airport didn't close, dozens of flights have been delayed. Heavy rainfall is normal for Mumbai during the monsoon season. But authorities say the intensity of the downpour over the past two days has been unprecedented. The weather department says there could be more rainfall overnight and people have been asked to stay indoors. Yogi Telomai The charity Save the Children estimates that around two-thirds of child marriages

happens in regions with higher than average climate risk. The reason vulnerable populations in these countries are at risk of being pushed further into poverty by extreme weather events and child marriages can be seen as one less mouth to feed. In Malawi's lakeside district of Mangotchi, a region increasingly wracked by drought. Some families dependent on fishing and farming say there is no other option. The BBC's Anne Okumu reports. It is early morning in Mangocchi on the shows of Lake Malawi. 16-year-old Hawa stands barefoot by the water.

Hawa was just 16 when she got married earlier this year. The legal age to marry in Malawi is 18. More frequent droughts have badly affected her family's income from fishing and farming. And with very little money for basics or education, Hawa says she believed marriage was her only option. Some days my father would come back home with nothing from the lake. There's been lots of hunger. It's very tough.

I decided to get married because I want to help my parents. But she was underage. Did you try to stop her? It hurt me to see her make that decision. But I was concerned. I would have loved her to continue with her education. According to the charity, save the children. 40 million girls will be living in hotspot countries by 2050.

who will be at a greater risk of extreme climate events and child marriage, defined as any marriage involving someone under 18. Malawi is among the top five countries most affected. The current law defining marriage came in 2017, with the minimum age of 18. The age of sexual consent remains at 16. But marriage below the minimum age is not criminalized. Arrests are only made when the girls involved are under 16, and a sexual offence has been committed.

MacBain works with the locals and the Malawian government to help prevent or overturn child marriages and to reintegrate underage brides back into the education system. The law that we have, starting with the Child Justice Act, the amended constitution, all those speak to protecting the girl child. But then the traditional law or customary law does not take that into consideration. So far, he's seeking. they have removed hundreds of girls from such marriages since 2023,

collaborating with legal officers, traditional chiefs and the police. After withdrawing them from child marriages, there is no support. Although Hauer says she's happy in her marriage, and is clear she was not pressured to marry beneath the weight of her sacrifice. She still carries the drive of who she hoped to become. If we had everything at home, I would have loved to continue with my education, become a teacher and better my life. And as long as climate change continues to worsen poverty,

the hopes and the potential of young women like Hawa may remain unfulfilled. Anne Okumu, India says it has conveyed its concerns to China about a mega dam being built on a river that runs through Tibet and India. Delhi said the dam along the Yarlung Sangpo, known as the Brahmaputra in India, would have implications for states lying downstream. Our South Asia regional editor and Barrasana Etirajan has more details. China has started constructing what will be the world's largest to hydropower dam in Tibet

that could have a serious impact on millions of people downstream in India and Bangladesh. India's concerns were raised during a meeting with the visiting Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi in Delhi. China hasn't commented on those discussions, but earlier Mr. Wang said the two countries should regard each other as partners instead of adversaries. Mr. Wang also met Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has confirmed his visit to China later this month to attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organization Summit. And Barasan Etirajan.

Now, if you believe the publicity, this year's US Open Tennis Championship is bigger and better, thanks to the introduction of a new-look mixed doubles event. The biggest tennis stars are teaming up to win one million, in dollars to compete against each other in the first week of the championship in New York and the format now consists of much shorter matches. But not everyone is happy about it. Some specialist mixed double players have been brushed aside, no longer invited to take part because they're not seen as big enough draws. Instead, the blockbuster lineup includes pairing such as

multiple grand slam winner Carlos Alcaraz, who was paired with the former US Open winner Emma Radcanu. This is what they said before the tournament started. I would like to know how much of the court he can cover in New York. I mean, he's just going to surf. I'm going to pull myself, you know, away, and I let her play. She will cover the court. She will be the boss. I will do whatever she wants me to do.

That's it. Well, the two young big hitters actually lost their match to number one seeds, Jack Draper and Jessica Pegula, who headed straight to the quarterfinals. BBC's sport described that game as entertaining, the crowd on the edge of their seats. Our sports reporter at Flushing Meadows in New York is Jonathan Jericho, and he spoke to the BBC's Nick Hatton about the new format. It's certainly polarised opinion, that's for sure. We got announced in February that the US Open were going to reimagine the mixed doubles.

And then in June, sort of exactly that was went up another notch when the superstars were announced who were going to play, namely Carlos Alcraz and Murad O'Carno, lots of other star names too, including. and Nova Jokovic, Egosfiontec, Janik Sinner, who's actually now pulled out. And it's been the talking point in the tennis world for the past few months, for sure. Yeah, it's a bold move, isn't it, by the United States Tennis Association? Why have they done this?

And the rationale was to elevate the event and create greater focus on the sport. And that means bringing it forward before the tournament, separating it from the singles and the other doubles. It's been streamed on American primetime TV, has been streamed across the world. So their argument is that they're putting more eyeballs on tennis and the stars. Now, the cynics will say, is that true or are they doing it just for money and to try to increase revenue in this week before the Grand Slam tournament? I'm stood outside the media centre here at Flushing Meadows and there's hundreds, thousands of people milling around

who are obviously here spending money, not necessarily on the gate and mission, but in the shop, on food, on beverages, etc. It does seem like it sold out for tomorrow night, which is when the semi-finals and the final will be held. And the men's and the women's doubles will remain, of course, as part of the US Open, which starts on Sunday. But how much of a slap in the face is this to those who usually play in the mix? A lot of doubles players are pretty angry about it.

And they see it as a lost opportunity to compete in a Grand Slam and win a Grand Slam title. And others say it devalues the slam as well. Jamie Murray, who is obviously one of the most famous, British doubles players. He kind of told me that he thinks that it's a glorified exhibition and that it's taking opportunities away from doubles players. Now, you know, there's a big, huge cash prize for the winners of $1 million. That's five times more than the champions, the mixed doubles champions received last year. It's a big, big chance to earn taken away from

those players. Jonathan Jericho speaking to Nick Hatton. And finally, norm to the loan of the Bayard tapestry. That's the title of an online petition in France, which has now received more than 43,000 signatures. The campaign was launched in July after this announcement in London by the French President Emmanuel Macron. In the run-up to the 1,000th anniversary of the birth of William the Conqueror, France will loan the United Kingdom the biotapestry. Ah, touché. The 70-meter-long embroidered cloth depicts the events, leading up to the Norman conquest of England in 1066, culminating in, of course, the Battle of Hastings.

The lone part of a proposed art exchange would mark the first time the medieval tapestry would be displayed in the United Kingdom. Art historian and journalist Didier Rikner created the petition. He described the work. It's called a tapestry, but it's not quite a tapestry. It's an embroidery, and it's very, very thin, you know. It's very long and very thin.

It's 70 meters long, and it's on a linen canvas, and it is very fragile. There are many holes, many tears, and it is why it's so impossible, so delicate, so dangerous to make it come to England. It is a unique object, you know. There is no other work of art of this kind anywhere in the world. It is the only embroidery of this size as old as this one, you know. So it is a heritage of humanity, and we cannot play with this. We cannot put it at risk only for political and diplomatic reasons. So if they were to transport it to the British Museum, how would they do that?

And what is the danger? What are you worried about happening? I am worried about what the restorers told me and the curators who have worked on this work of art, and they tell me everybody told me the same thing. It's very fragile, and they want to put it in a box and to make it travel by road, not by train, not by plane, but by road. They tell there are less vibrations by road, but there are many vibrations anyway. Any move is very delicate and very dangerous for the embroidery.

Every researcher and curators who have worked on this piece of art tells there will be a T-ring, there will be holes. So the wool which is on the linens could fall, some of these accidents will be irreversible. In your petition you described this loan as a true heritage crime. Can you talk to us about that? About how important this tapestry is to France. This tapestry is important to France, but it is important for England. It is important for the world.

And there is no other work of art of this kind. We compare often with La Joconde, Monalien. Lisa with paintings by Grandmasters. But paintings by great masters, there are many. There is only one tapiscript by you. Lots of people have really criticised the idea of this and that the biotapestry, it's not worth endangering such a unique piece of art.

Why do you think the British Museum is willing to give it a go? I am very disappointed by the British Museum, because it is a museum, and they know very well, it's not possible to do this without a risk. Well, they have said that their collections department can handle this and does this sort of thing all the time. Yes, but not all the time with such a work of art. And it's not believing, I don't believe it's dangerous. I know it's dangerous because I've talked with many restaurants who work on the tapestry.

And they all tell me it's very dangerous for the tapestry. I think symbolically it would be a great thing to lend it to England. But it's not possible. It's just not possible. We should be united English and French to tell it's not possible. Didier Rikner. And that's all from us for now, but there will be a new edition of the Global News Podcast later. If you want to comment on this podcast or any of the topics covered in it, you can send us an email. The address is Global Podcast at bbc.co.uk. You can also find us on X at BBC World Service. Use the hashtag Global NewsPoint.

This edition was mixed by Caroline Driscoll and the producers were Guy Pitt and Stephanie Tillotson. The editor is Karen Martin. I'm Julia McFarlane. Until next time, goodbye.