Global News Podcast - Netanyahu aide accused of changing 7 October documents

Episode Date: November 16, 2024

An aide to the Israeli PM has been accused of altering 7 October records to improve Mr Netanyahu's image. Also: the growing trade in smuggling tarantulas, and why people prefer AI-generated poetry.

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T's and C's apply. going to unravel this all. From the BBC World Service, this is World of Secrets, season five, Finding Mr. Fox. Search for World of Secrets wherever you get your BBC podcasts. This is the Global News podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Janat Jalil and in the early hours of Saturday 16th November these are our main stories. An aide to the Israeli Prime Minister is accused of trying to alter phone records to make it look as though Benjamin Netanyahu reacted quicker to the Hamas attacks last

year. Ukraine's leader responds angrily to a phone call between the German Chancellor and the Russian President. South Africa's police minister refuses a request to stop detaining illegal miners who are running out of food as they remain underground. Also in this podcast... They're not going to be detected in an x-ray machine. They're not going to set off the metal detector and so he obviously thought he was going to be able to get through security, get on his plane and get home and sell them for a high profit.

The growing trade in smuggling tarantulas and other creepy crawlies. The Hamas attacks on October the 7th last year will be remembered not only as a day that traumatised Israel but as possibly the biggest security failure in Israeli history. Now Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is facing accusations that not only was he too slow to respond but that his aides have been trying to cover up his failures. It's emerged that police have interviewed Mr Netanyahu's chief of staff, Sahih Braverman, on suspicion of trying to alter phone records to make it look like the Prime Minister responded more quickly to the attack than he did. Mr Braverman is also accused

of taking classified documents. Our correspondent in Jerusalem, Jonathan Beal, told me more about the investigation. This has only come to light because a court gagging order was lifted and we now know that the Chief of Staff for Benjamin Netanyahu was questioned by police for five hours, which is a pretty long time, about phone calls that occurred on the morning of October the 7th. And we know that a call took place at 6.29 and there was a call at 6.40, so in other words, 11-minute gap between each call. Now, the official record shows that the call that matters was the 6.40am call, where Binyamin Netanyahu talked to his security adviser and issued directions. His

chief of staff, Mr Braverman, says the discussions about what happened started earlier than the official records show. And more than that, he has changed the official record, even after officials refused to do that, changed the time, not the content, to say that the call where he issued guidance and instructions happened at 6.29 when the official record says it happened at 6.40. So there's that discrepancy. But the question will obviously be, did he do it to make his boss look better, that he was taking action quicker than he did? Or was there a gap of 11 minutes before he got everything together and started issuing instructions? We know already that

there were huge intelligence failures around the attacks on October the 7th and that some people have resigned as a result. But Benjamin Netanyahu has always said, now is not the time for a full investigation because he says Israel has got its hands full fighting wars on multiple fronts, but people are suspicious. Because after all, those October the 7th attacks last year by Hamas have been described by many as the biggest military and intelligence failure in Israel's history. So there are many questions that people still want answered. And it all comes of course as Benjamin Netanyahu

is midway through a trial on corruption charges in which he's due to testify next month. Yes, I mean, you know, it's not a great time for him and he tried to get that trial postponed and this whole, you know, questions about whether there was a cover-up in government about what happened, about phone calls and then what's happened as far as his court appearance, him trying to put off a trial about allegations of corruption, his own difficulties inside government with ministers at odds with him not believing his priorities are right. And then obviously trying to keep his coalition together with members of the far right party, the ultra-orthodox

Jews who, you know, not everybody agrees with certainly and one of them has been accused of interfering in police affairs recently by the attorney general. Mix it all together and it is potentially a very dangerous time for Benjamin Netanyahu. Jonathan Beale in Jerusalem. Ukraine has reacted angrily after the German Chancellor Olaf Schultz spoke on the phone to the Russian leader Vladimir Putin. President Vladimir Zelensky said the call undermined efforts to isolate Russia but he's spoken positively about the possible impact of Donald Trump's election victory in the United States

saying the war would end sooner with a new team in the White House. Warren Ball reports. In their first conversation in two years, Olaf Schultz told Vladimir Putin that Russian troops should withdraw from Ukraine. He said Berlin would support Ukraine for as long as necessary and that any deal on Ukraine must involve Kiev. President Zelenskyy was dismissive of the phone call, saying such talks were very important for the Russian leader in his desire to weaken his isolation. The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry

went further, describing the call as an attempt at appeasement. Warren Ball, as we record this podcast, a standoff at an abandoned gold mine in South Africa between hundreds of illegal miners who are underground in a disused shaft and police trying to arrest them shows no sign of ending. Because the miners entered the shaft in Steele Fontaine deliberately desperate to retrieve gold or mineral residues, the authorities have taken a hard line blocking food and water supplies. South Africa's police minister has refused to request to stop arresting the miners who eventually

emerge. Hundreds have come out but those who remain are said to be increasingly sick and weak. One body was brought out on Thursday. The national coordinator of mining affected communities United in Action, Meshaq Mbengul, called on the government to soften its tough stance. What you are saying firstly is let's be human. Let's make sure those people are safe. Let's take out those people out there. It's devastating to hear ministers say we will smoke them out

when people are down there because of poverty. Unemployment rates in South Africa are so high, people are living in poverty and starving. So they went there not just to risk their life, but to put bread on the table. Our Southern Africa correspondent, Nomsa Maseko, has been at the mine in Steele Fontein. The police minister arrived earlier to assess the situation, but he was met by a protest by a group of relatives and community members whose loved ones are still beneath the surface. And the people who were gathering there were quite angry about the government's utterances

of saying that they would not send any help underground, and that the people who were underground are criminals who deserve to be smoked out. There were those who were supporting the minister's utterances saying that the people who are underground normally terrorize communities, they are involved in, you know, rape and murder, even though none of them have been charged for that, while others have said that the constitution of this country has said that the right to life is something that should be upheld and that the government of this country has the responsibility to ensure that those who are still underground and are willing to resurface, they are helped

and not even arrested because most of them are leaving the loot underground and just coming out with nothing. In terms of the are leaving the loot underground and just coming out with nothing. In terms of the numbers, the volunteers who have been going down underground every day have told us that they believe that it is thousands, at least 4,000 mine workers who are underground, but police are saying it's just a few hundred. But, you know, whatever the number is, it's still the fact that it's people that are underground. And it is slowly looking like it is going

to become a humanitarian crisis. One decomposing body was pulled out. It's unclear how the man died, but police are investigating. Nomsa Maseko. Let's go now to the breakaway Georgian Republic of Abkhazia. Where on Friday demonstrators using a truck stormed the parliament building and presidential complex in protest at a planned real estate deal with Russia as lawmakers had gathered there to discuss it. The Black Sea region is backed by Moscow but the protesters say they fear giving Russians the right to buy property there

will destroy its natural beauty and price them out. Sasha Slikta told us more. It all started a few days ago when the self-styled president of Abkhazia decided to push through a deal he signed with the Russians and the deal gives favorable terms to Russian investors wishing to place money into Abkhazia. The opposition says the government is placing the Russians higher than the Abkhaz themselves, so the protest started. But in general, Aslan Bajaniyeh, the self-starred Abkhaz president, is very unpopular.

So this was almost a pretext. So there were protests, and today parliament in the capital, Suhumi, was supposed to ratify that agreement. But they couldn't come to an agreement on the agenda, so Parliament was suspended. But this didn't appease the protesters. They were chanting and shouting outside Parliament. There is a ring of steel around Parliament. They drove a truck through the metal gates, and then the people poured in. Then they tried to negotiate but

they failed so they broke down the doors and prized open the metal bars on the windows and they flooded into parliament. So it seems in the short term, Lisa, these protests have worked because what Abkhazians were worried about was that this region which is famed for its natural beauty, for its beaches, would be covered with apartment complexes owned by Russians. Exactly. It is a magical place, Abkhazia. I spent two summers when I was still a student on the Black Sea in Abkhazia. A lush green hills, flowers, smells of subtropical climate. It's lovely. The Abkhaz are a very,

very proud nation. They have a culture of their own. They're an ancient people. They see themselves as completely separate from the Georgians. But some opposition leaders of some parties say that it is too late now and that the president has to go. I mean, all presidents in Abkhazia become unpopular because they are all supported by Russia, because without Russian help, Abkhazia will simply not exist. Because it's been cut off from Georgia unnaturally, so Russia has to pump in money into Abkhazia for it to be a viable entity. And then the Russians say, well, we need something in return. We're giving you so much money.

At least let us invest money or build properties in some nice tourist spots. Sasha Slikda. Now, it's certainly not the kind of excess baggage I would be tempted to take on a plane, but a South Korean citizen has been stopped by officials leaving Peru with an incredible haul of creepy crawlies hidden on him. More than 300 venomous tarantulas, 110 centipedes and nine bullet ants. Professor Alice Hughes, Associate Professor of Biology at the University of Hong Kong, is an expert on the arachnid trade. Firstly, what were the risks to this smuggler?

The bullet ants, those are called bullet ants because when they bite you it feels like you've been shot. Trinitrullis themselves have some degree of venom so they can deliver a pretty nasty bite. It's not normally fatal but it's unpleasant and they're covered in urticating hairs. So if you get those in you, you're also going to develop a very nasty crash. And so it could have been a very unpleasant experience had they escaped on him. But he must have calculated that the benefits outweighed the risks. Well, the thing is with invertebrates, they're not going to be detected in an X-ray machine. They're not going to set off the metal detector.

And so he obviously thought he was going to be able to get through security, get on his plane and get home and sell them for a high profit. And the reality is under the current pet trade market, they are enormously valuable. Given that he had more than 300 individuals in his person, that's a significant profit. Is it an illegal trade? For the tarantulas, it would be an illegal trade because they are listed on something called CITES and that means that the international trade of them is meant to be regulated. But for many other spider species, there is virtually no international regulation on trade.

So if he had chosen something a little less valuable, actually he could just have sent it through the post and it probably would not have been detected, but also the legality would be much grayer. Does that happen, insects being posted? Yes, a lot of spiders are sold in boxes. Mystery boxes are one of the most popular ways for enthusiasts to get a new collection of spiders. So you open up your mystery box of spiders and see what comes out because typically spiders will be sent

in either boxes or if they're smaller so they're in egg sacks they'll just be sent in envelopes in the post. I mean as you've already said it's a grey area some of this trade is legal, some of it is illegal. But is it growing? In parts of the world like Asia, it is unquestionably growing, again, because there is often limited space within many houses in Asia. Having small animals that you can stack up boxes on top of each other in a small space are the ideal pet. I mean, as far as I understand, tarantulas, bullet ants are not indigenous to say northern

Europe. What are the risks of one of these escaping? So it depends where you go. In places like South Africa, they are very careful about the import of spiders for that very reason. There is a very large chance that if you're arachnid from South America, escaped in South Africa, it could well become naturalised. Within somewhere like Europe, the climate is much cooler, so

in southern Europe they probably would establish. In northern Europe it's going to depend on what species you're looking at. However, those invertebrates can also carry their own parasites and they can carry various pathogens and that would also be a risk to native species. That was Professor Alice Hughes talking to Julian Marshall. Still to come, can you tell the difference between an AI generated poem, when winter's frost does chill the wintry air and all the earth is covered in a shroud. And the genuine Shakespeare. And there reigns love and all love's loving parts, and all those friends which I thought buried. A new study reveals that more of us prefer the AI poetry. This podcast is brought to you by WISE, the app that helps you manage your money internationally.

With WISE, you have up to 40 currencies at your fingertips. You can receive money, pay bills, and send money across borders without hidden fees. You always get the real-time mid-market exchange rates. See exactly what you pay, every time. Join millions of WISE customers worldwide. Download the WISE app today or visit wise.com. T's and C's apply. Witness the stories that have shaped our world. On the launch pad, in the dawn light, a towering symbol of an ambitious nation.

Three, two, one. The whole of India ambitious nation. 3, 2, 1... The whole of India was watching. Told by the people who were there. I still don't regret that I was part of the Rose Revolution. I was a witness of very exciting days. Witness history from the BBC World Service. Listen wherever you get your BBC podcasts.

You're listening to the Global News Podcast. As toxic smog continues to blanket northern Pakistan, millions of people in the worst affected province of Punjab have been told to remain indoors. In recent days, the city of Lahore has won the unwelcome distinction of being the world's most polluted city. A health emergency has now been declared in Lahore and another city, Multan. While pollution alerts happen every year, our Pakistan correspondent Caroline Davies says this year's crisis is unprecedented. If you bear in mind that anything over 300 on the air quality index is considered to be hazardous.

The numbers we've seen in Lahore, for example, over the last two weeks, it's been peaking at 1,000, 1,500 we've seen. And in the city of Multan, which is also quite just a few hours away from Lahore, that has peaked at 2,000 and above. So really extraordinarily unprecedented numbers. The other things that have been fairly extraordinary have been the fact that this is happening a bit earlier in the season than most people would have expected there to be such dense smog in the area. So why is that? Why is it so bad so early on? Because there hasn't been rain,

there hasn't been wind to be able to shift this pollution on. It has just sat there. So we're now over two weeks since we first started seeing the levels peaking in Lahore. And it's got so thick and so dense that it's now visible from space. So what are the authorities doing to tackle this? Today we heard a sort of fairly dramatic announcement from one of the senior ministers of the Punjab government. They've said that they are stopping construction activities in the city. Brick kilns and furnaces will not be allowed to operate until the 23rd of

November. They're also telling restaurants in these two cities that they're not going to be allowed to have customers dine in after 4pm and people won't be allowed to take takeaways after 8pm. Now you might ask how does that help things? The main issue really I think is that they're probably wanting people to stop moving around the city and breathing in this large amounts of these toxic fumes and just continuing with life as normal. But these are all short-term measures. What is needed as a long term strategy because we hear about this year after year, this smog that descends on this region, largely caused by stubble burning by farmers, but also by

factories and traffic. What are the authorities doing to address this long term? Longer term prospects include doing things like improving public transport and making things electrified and having better regulation on places like, you know, with stubble burning. But of course, that all requires a budget and a lot of will and enforcement. And that is the big question is it's relatively easy to make these sorts of promises when you've got big problems being faced right now. The big question and the big test will be whether this is followed through in the course of the next year or so, so that next year is better than the last.

Caroline Davies in Islamabad. Afghans with their long and tragic history are among the top asylum seekers in the world. The Taliban rulers' refusal to let half the population work or get educated simply because they are female on top of the extreme poverty caused by decades of war, which these millions of people going hungry means that thousands of Afghans try to flee every day. But leaving has become harder than ever with countries like Pakistan, Iran and Turkey cracking down on illegal migration. Despite this many Afghans managed to enter the UK illegally in small boats.

The BBC has had rare access to those attempting to flee Afghanistan. Our South Asia correspondent, Yogita Limaye, reports. On the outskirts of Kabul, I've come to a quiet area to meet a man who served in the Afghan military. He's made three unsuccessful attempts to try to get from Afghanistan to Europe in the past two and a half years. We're not identifying him for his safety, but I'm going to ask him that why despite the fact that so many have lost their lives trying to make the journey, that he still wants to make another attempt. I'll keep trying to flee even if I lose my life.

Our circumstances are such that we are dying every moment. I'm at a bus station in Kabul. It's really bustling. And this is where some of our interviewees have told us they started their journey out of the country, taking a bus from here to the western border near Iran. That's where they met with people smugglers who then gave them the route to cross the border and at each point they're handed from one smuggler to another as they attempt to make their way from Afghanistan to Iran to Turkey and eventually to Europe. It's a journey that's fraught with risks.

A month ago, Iran was accused of indiscriminately shooting at Afghan migrants crossing the border on foot. The BBC has seen verified videos of the dead and injured. If migrants make it through Iran, they have to make a nearly 20-foot jump across a border wall. they have to make a nearly 20 foot jump across a border wall. In videos sent to us by an Afghan smuggling from Iran, he can be heard shouting, run, run, don't be scared, just jump. On the other side of the wall, they could be detained and beaten by Turkish border guards.

detained and beaten by Turkish border guards. The smuggler sent us one video of Afghans shirtless, hands tied behind their backs, some with big bruises, pleading for help. Turkey and Iran have not responded to the allegations. I spoke to the smuggler over the phone. You're endangering the lives of Afghans, taking thousands of dollars from them, engaging in this criminal activity. How do you justify that? We don't force people to take these risks.

We tell them they could be killed or imprisoned. What are we supposed to do when people tell us their family is going hungry in Afghanistan? For those who make it through Turkey, there are more life-threatening choices to make. I've come to the grave of a man who served in the Afghan military fighting against the Taliban before 2021. We are not identifying him because his family still lives here in Kabul and they fear that there might be reprisal against them. But their fathers agreed to speak to us under the condition of anonymity. The man drowned when the small inflatable dinghy he was in sank soon after it left Turkey

for Greece. His father blames foreign countries who are fighting in Afghanistan. We were in the trenches together. If we knew we would be abandoned and betrayed, no one would have joined hands with the international forces. The UK is where many Afghans want to end up. They are the second biggest group coming to the country in small boats.

We've come to Liverpool to meet an asylum seeker. She arrived in the UK in a small boat six months ago. She used to be an employee of the former government of Afghanistan, and she protested against the Taliban. She should be eligible for one of the UK's resettlement schemes. But progress has simply been too slow for many at risk, forcing them to take dangerous illegal routes. I come from a well-known family. I've never done anything illegal, but I was afraid I would be detained

and tortured in Afghanistan. Coming to the UK is a choice many Afghans are forced to make because home can't provide the most basic of needs, safety, food, freedom. That report by Youuggita Lemaye. For the first time this weekend, a major retailer will open for business seven days a week on the Isle of Lewis in the Hebrides, a collection of islands off the north-west coast of Scotland. The supermarket giant Tesco will begin trading on Sundays, going against the long-standing

tradition of observing the Sabbath on the Isle. More than 1,800 people have signed an online petition opposing the move, our Scotland correspondent, Katrina Renton, reports. Around 7,000 people live in Stornoway on the Isle of Lewis. Observance of the Sabbath has survived here, even after it disappeared from most other parts of Scotland. The Bible's fourth commandment lays down that Sunday is a holy day for worship and rest from work and other activities. But much has changed over time. Gone are the Sundays

when children's play parks were closed on the island and the swings tied up. Many people do not go to church and over the past 20, ferries and flights on a Sunday have been introduced. Some pubs, restaurants and a petrol station with a shop are open. So why not a supermarket? Handy if you find yourself out of bread or milk on a Sunday. There is no need, says Reverend Kenneth Stewart, the minister at Stornoway Reformed Presbyterian Church. That's what neighbours are for.

Most of us have grown up in these island communities where we're thoroughly glued together. If you lack something like that, just knock on your neighbour's door. People we spoke to in the town expressed a range of views. It is a tradition that everybody should have the day off and it is a nice idea to have that day of rest and you know that you don't have to go anywhere. I mean the pubs and all that are open on Sunday so why not Tesco? It might be beneficial for some people who might need to use Tesco. I think it's going to spoil everything.

Tesco said it had received a significant amount of positive reaction to the plans and it was confident that the decision to open here on Sundays would allow it to balance the demand for seven-day opening while remaining respectful to local traditions and culture. Katrina Renton. Findings published in the journal Scientific Reports reveal that people can't tell the difference between human and AI poetry and sometimes even prefer the non-human generated poems. The study used AI to write poetry in the style of ten poets such as Shakespeare and Sylvia Plath. Participants were then presented with ten poems in random order, five from a real poet and five AI imitations. And they scored the AI poems higher, attributing

their marks to creativity and emotional quality. In the same spirit then Anita Anand challenged Pulitzer Prize winning poet Paul Muldoon to detect the human from the AI offering in this test. Here is take one. When winter's frost does chill the wintry air and all the earth is covered in a shroud my thoughts turn to thee gentle and and fair, and in thy love I find a warmth endowed. Number two. Thy bosom is endeared with all hearts, which I by lacking had supposed dead. And there

reigns love and all love's loving parts, and all those friends which I thought buried. The first one I think was written by A because there is of course lots of poetry that is written by real people which is actually not very good. You're right, you nailed it. The first one was by AI and the second one was by the actual William Shakespeare. Do you know what I did though? I did ask ChatGPT to write me a poem in the style of Paul Muldoon. Alright, in the corner of the field where the earth begins, its slow turn to stone, I find an old man's coat tucked beneath the hedge, its sleeve still holding the shape

of something once broad-shouldered, once hopeful. A songbird hops from branch to branch, its call a low murmur like a half-forgotten name lost in the thicket of half-thoughts and wintering. Okay, could you have written something like that? I would hope not. You know, first of all, we are all capable of writing really badly. There's always an element of risk involved. There's always an element of chance. So I myself don't really believe that I write my own poems. I feel that I am used as a vehicle for the poems, as a medium for the poems. So the idea of there being a force, in this case the algorithms of computers, having some power in the world, is not one that I would absolutely discount.

My mind is being blown here. So the same force that comes through Paul Muldoon you think could come through chat GPT? Here's the big difference I think. When I set out to write a poem or when a poem sets out to write itself through me, I certainly am not thinking of writing a Paul Muldoon poem. I'm thinking of writing something that is definitely not a Paul Muldoon poem. That was Paul Muldoon talking to Anita Annand. 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 the topics covered or the poems, you can

send us an email. The address is globalpodcast.bbc.co.uk. You can also find us on x at global news pod. This edition was mixed by Derek Clark, the producer was Alison Davies, the editor is Karen Martin. I'm Jeanette Jalil. Until next time. Goodbye. This podcast is brought to you by WISE, the app that helps you manage your money internationally. With WISE, you have up to 40 currencies at your fingertips. You can receive money, pay bills, and send money across borders without hidden fees. You always get the real-time mid-market exchange rates. See exactly what you pay, every time. Join millions of WISE customers worldwide. Download the WISE app

today or visit wise.com. T's and T's apply. When we left, there was this wonderful feeling. But it was only the beginning of a nightmare. This is a story that started with a job advert. A yacht owner looking for a crew to sell his recently renovated boat from Brazil to Europe. For me, it was going to be a great adventure and an opportunity to gain a lot of experience. But when police raided the vessel and discovered drugs... Cocaine hidden under one of the beds. It can't be.

..a key suspect was miles away. Everything revolved around him. Who's the boss? A British guy. Fox. Fox. This is World of Secrets from the BBC World Service, season five, Finding Mr Fox. Search for World of Secrets wherever you get your BBC podcasts.