Global News Podcast - UN cancels polio vaccine plans in northern Gaza

Episode Date: October 23, 2024

The UN says Israel's bombardment of northern Gaza has delayed its polio vaccine campaign. Also: Donald Trump's team accuse Britain's ruling Labour party of election interference, and the reinvention of classical music.

Hello, this is the Global News podcast from the BBC World Service with reports and analysis from across the world. The latest news seven days a week. BBC World Service podcasts are supported by advertising. This week on Witness History, in 1970, Gary Gygax was fired. And that event, believe it or not, changed the gaming industry forever. He went on to create Dungeons & Dragons. In the 50 years since its release, the tabletop roleplay game has generated billions of dollars in sales and now boasts more than 50 million players worldwide. Search and subscribe to Witness History wherever you get your BBC podcast.

This is the Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Nick Miles and at 13 Hours GMT on Wednesday the 23rd of October, these are our main stories. The UN says it has to delay a mass polio vaccination campaign in Gaza because of Israel's bombardment. Donald Trump's team accuses the ruling Labour Party in Britain of foreign interference in the US election. A French woman at the centre of a mass rape trial that shocked the country takes to the stand for the first time. Also in this podcast. Our culture is often told back to Africans from outsiders. All you're going to see is trauma, how we were slaves. No, we have to tell them by stories.

British actor Idris Elba's plan to roll out the red carpet in Africa. We start in the Middle East. The contrast between the air-conditioned rooms where the diplomats meet to talk about ceasefires and life for people in war-torn Gaza could not be starker. We'll have more on the latest discussions between the US and Israel in a moment. But first to the situation on the ground in Gaza. The World Health Organization says it's cancelling a second round of immunisation of children against polio in much of the northern part of the territory. Our Middle East regional editor Mike Thompson told me more.

It's really the continuing violence there Nick, it says that's been escalating along with intense bombardment, mass displacement orders and a lack of assured humanitarian pauses in the fighting. And this makes it incredibly difficult for families to bring their children safely to these centres. And the problem with all this, of course, is you've still got nearly 120,000 children that need to have the second phase of this vaccine and if they don't get it that means all the other children in central and southern Gaza around 445,000 of them their whole status their health status against polio is endangered. There haven't been many cases

of polio in Gaza there have been a few and I believe at least one child has been paralysed from this. The concern must be that if there are a small number of cases, given the conditions across Gaza with people crowded together, it could spread very quickly. Quite right, Nick. Yes, I mean, 90% vaccination is needed and that's both phases, first and second. So you've got this big number of children who need to be vaccinated within six weeks of that first vaccination. So if this doesn't happen, then of course, you know, it endangers everybody else because you have to keep that level up. And because of sanitary conditions, we've seen water sanitation, the whole health system,

sewage in the territory has taken a real battering with the war and that makes things even more likely to spread. And that window of opportunity is narrowing rapidly. All the time it's narrowing so if it was a case of saying if it was just if it was a longer period of a couple of months fine maybe the wait could carry on but we're now up against a very tight deadline. Mike Thompson, well the WHO announcement came as the US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken was concluding a trip to Israel. His 11th visit to the region since the

conflict in Gaza began. Shortly before leaving for Saudi Arabia he called on Israel to end the war. Israel has achieved most of its strategic objectives when it comes to Gaza, all with the idea of making sure that October 7th could never happen again. In the space of a year, it's managed to dismantle Hamas's military capacity. It's destroyed a bunch of its arsenal. It's eliminated its senior leadership, including most recently Yahya Sinwar. This has covered the cost, great cost, to Palestinian civilians

in Gaza. Now is the time to turn those successes into an enduring strategic success. Our correspondent in Jerusalem, Yulan Nel, was listening. This is very consistent with what Washington has been saying since it was confirmed that Yahya Sinwar, the mastermind of the deadly 7th of October attacks on Israel, have been killed last week. Really sort of reiterating that, you know, it's a diplomatic opening now. Turn that success into a sort of diplomatic achievement. Washington trying to restart efforts to get a ceasefire and hostage deal for Gaza. Mr. Blinken also met hostage families in Tel Aviv during his trip. And whether the Israelis have really taken that

message on board, I mean, remains to be seen. Certainly we have not been hearing for the moment from the Israeli Prime Minister sort of anything to suggest that he's really looking to wind down the war in Gaza. We've had the Israelis saying that they will continue until their war goals have been achieved. Well there's no sign either that Israel is letting up on its war aims with Hezbollah and Lebanon. Lebanese media say Israeli airstrikes have begun in the city of Tyre in the south of the country. Let's speak to Jonathan Head in Beirut. These are pretty big airstrikes. I mean we're used to the Israelis identifying specific

buildings and telling people to leave those. In this case they actually defined pretty much the entire sort of city centre of Tyre, at least the core part of it. It was many blocks of buildings as the evacuation zone. There's a lot of panic trying to get people out. It's a big city, it's got a lot of displaced people in it, hundreds of thousands of residents and pretty soon after those warnings the bombings began. I don't think we've got a complete count but it's certainly well over 10, could be as many as 20. So those areas are scenes of complete devastation. We've seen what Israeli bombs can do. They can bring entire multi-story buildings down with one strike. What we don't know is how much damage

may have been done to the UNESCO World Heritage Site. This is one of the most illustrious cities of classical times, an incredible historical site. It's also very special to the Lebanese. It's one of their favourite cities, very important. So this part of Tire has not been attacked before. We've seen outer neighbourhoods attacked and of course other towns in the south have been absolutely pounded. But I think for Lebanese who have endured so much, this is a very distressing scene indeed to see such a beautiful town being hit so hard. Jonathan, Israel once again is saying it's targeting legitimate Hezbollah sites. Do we know to what extent Hezbollah is still able to hit back at Israel with attacks of its own? Well we know what it is doing, which is pretty much every day there are rocket strikes, occasionally

drones, occasionally the odd missile, but they haven't been able to launch anything devastating at Israel. The most serious attack was that one drone that got through, well, 10, 11 days ago now, to an Israeli army base and killed a number of young conscripts. But apart from that, Israel seems to be able to intercept it. And one wonders whether Hezbollah's essentially just keeping up a steady pace, usually about 200 rockets a day, just to show that Israel has not achieved its war aim

of completely crippling Hezbollah's capacity. Apart from that, we don't know how much of its missile arsenal is left. And of course, we know very little about the current state of leadership given that now all the identifiable leaders have either been killed or in the case of one of them we believe is out of the country. And briefly Jonathan, without a leadership of Hezbollah, what opportunities are there for potential ceasefire talks? Makes it very difficult but there of course would have to be an appetite on the Israeli side

and we've seen no sign of that. The Lebanese government pleads for peace all the time. The Lebanese people are desperate for it. But sadly, Lebanon is a country which, while being very much a victim of this war, has very little say over when it stops. The Lebanese government doesn't have the power to do that. Only Hezbollah and Israel have the power to end this war and at this stage we're not hearing of any interest from them in that. Jonathan Haidt. The British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has sought to play down claims by Donald Trump's lawyers that members of his Labour Party are interfering in the American presidential election. The Trump campaign has filed a complaint to US regulators after Labour

sent volunteers to campaign for the Democratic candidate and Vice President Kamala Harris. Keir Starmer said those involved were volunteers who traveled to the US in their own time. So how big a deal is this? Here's our Westminster correspondent Rob Watson. I guess Nick, how big a deal it is depends on who wins the election and what happens after that but I mean look certainly this is highly unusual I mean unprecedented for a US presidential campaign to be lashing out at the governing party of one of its closest allies, especially given how Brits have been volunteering in US elections and vice versa for decades. Why do you think that Donald Trump's team is reacting in the way it is?

I think there are two reasons. The first is that I think in this very, very close election the Trump campaign has decided that, hey, maybe summoning up the revolutionary spirit of 1776 and US independence from Britain could be a vote winner. But I think secondly, and this is perhaps more warring for the Labour government back here in the UK, it probably reflects a dim view of Labour by some in the Trump team. And you were pointing out earlier that actually, depending on who wins the White House in November, that may have an impact on relations with the Labour government. What about sort of longer term, any impact do you think of this?

Well I think there are two views Nick. The first view is that look, US UK relationship is too deep, too important to both sides for anything to derail it, even though it's pretty clear isn't it, that Labour have closer ties to the Democrats and President Trump's not a great fan of Labour. I mean the second contrary alternative view is that a Trump administration might hold a grudge

and that this really could be a real diplomatic headache for Keir Starmer and his government post a Trump victory. I think more money is on option one but you couldn't rule out option two either. Rob Watson. The British actor Idris Elba is on a mission to bring African cinema to a worldwide audience. The Hollywood star has been speaking to the BBC about his plans to build two new film studios, as well as a whole new eco-city. Thomas Nardi reports. Idris Elba is a star of both the small and big screens.

Among his many film roles, he has played Nelson Mandela in Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom. I have fought against white domination. I have fought against black domination. I have cherished the idea of a free, democratic society. Elba is a passionate advocate for the progression of African cinema and for Africans

telling their own stories. Our culture has oftentimes been told back to Africans from outsiders. All you're going to see is trauma, how we were slaves, how we were colonised. No, we have to tell them by our stories, you know, and that's why it's important. At the three-day summit in Accra, he urged African leaders and policymakers to recognise the industry's potential for soft power and to invest in Accra. He urged African leaders and policymakers to recognize the industry's potential for soft power and to invest in its growth. He says he has his own plans to build a film studio in Ghana.

The business of building a film studio is so multi-layered. So for me, I've been doing two at the same time. One, which is encouraging the National Film Authority with their efforts to bolster a policy that encourages filmmaking, and at the same time, finding the right appropriate land and the right appropriate people to help me build. I can say that I think I've found a site where we can build on.

And it's not just Ghana that he has his sights on. Earlier this year, the star was allocated land in the Tanzanian archipelago of Zanzibar. He has plans to launch a studio there too. His ambitions don't just lay with strengthening Africa's film environment. He's also working on a long-term project to regenerate Shibu Island off the coast of Sierra Leone and turn it into an eco-friendly smart city. It's been six years we've been working on that project and it's gonna take another 20 years before we see it in its full fruition.

Now we are working on the feasibility studies for build and God willing in the next few years we'll have started to break ground. Proud of his African heritage, Elba envisions making somewhere in Africa his permanent home one day. My mum is from Ghana, my dad's from Sierra Leone, so I was raised in a household that had both cultures.

I'm a godboy, so I like my son, I like to eat. I love to be around culture and community, you know. So when I come home to Ghana, I feel very sort of, you know, attached to that side. And we don't speak the language yet, but I'm learning. Idris Elba. Still to come. Is that a new genre of classical music?

This week on Witness History, in 1970, Gary Gygax was fired. And that event, believe it or not, changed the gaming industry forever. He went on to create Dungeons & Dragons. In the 50 years since its release, the tabletop roleplay game has generated billions of dollars in sales and now boasts more than 50 million players worldwide. Search and subscribe to Witness History wherever you get your BBC podcast. In the southern French town of Avignon, Gisèle Pellico has been giving evidence in the trial of her ex-husband and 50 other men who were accused of raping her. The 71-year-old was drunk by her husband, who then allowed the men to abuse her over a number of years. Her husband, Dominique Pellico, has admitted the charges

against him, but the majority of his co-defendants deny raping her. Our correspondent in Paris is Hugh Schofield. This halfway point in the trial, because it's a long-running trial, we've been going for a month already, she's given the chance to react to the evidence that's been presented so far against about half of the 50 accused. And what she said today was in the tenor of which we've heard already from her, a dignified woman who is still utterly incomprehensive or doesn't understand why her husband did

what he did. She took the stand and straightaway said, I want to address myself to my husband who's in court of course, but I can't look at him in the face. And she said to him, Dominique, we had a perfect life together. We were together for 50 years. I was fulfilled. You were fulfilled. We had children and grandchildren together. I will never comprehend, she said, the extent of your betrayal how could you have introduced these strangers these men into the intimacy of our bedroom and that you know that is core of this extraordinary case the fact that uncontested that it's

a fact that her husband over many years drugged her at night repeatedly and then brought into their bedroom men who he'd contacted local men who he contacted over the internet and with them sexually abused his wife. She said, my life has been destroyed, I don't know whether now at the age of nearly 72 I will ever recover, but I've got courage. People say I've got courage, but it's not courage, it's determination to ensure that this does not happen again, that society changes. And I think that again this idea, which which is very current that she's become a kind of feminist icon but in a way an icon just for sort of human decency and dignity speaking publicly about all this of course she had the chance to have the trial behind closed doors but wave that

right she said I'm doing this speaking publicly showing my face every day to the cameras so that future rape victims can say, Madam Pelico did it, I'll do it too. Half way through the trial, Hugh, how long is it expected to last? Well, we know it'll last for another four or so weeks. I mean, you've got to remember that there are 50 accused, not just Dominique Pelico, of course the principal accused, but then these 50 other individuals who each deserve and have the right to, and a separate kind of review of their particular circumstances and each one has to be has his own lawyer has his own

defense and the prosecution has to make a case separately for each one so it's a long-running process and throughout this Madame Pelico is sitting there with her husband in the room as well often watching these extremely graphic videos showing herself being abused in terrible ways and well we have another four weeks of that to go through now. Hugh Schofield. The Peruvian priest Gustavo Gutierrez who spent much of his life working among the poor in the capital Lima has died. Many priests in several countries in the 1960s and 70s embraced his idea known as liberation

theology. The religion should champion the needs of the poor and dispossessed. Here's a clip of him speaking in 2014 after receiving an award for his work at an American university. Liberation theology springs from this question how to say to the poor persons God love you because the daily life of the poor is a very painful situation. Our Latin America specialist Vanessa Bushluta told us more about it. Gustavo Gutierrez is known as the father of liberation theology. He was really the man who laid out that theory, which as you said, can be encapsulated as the idea that the church should be fighting, should be getting involved in making the life of the poor better and to cut down on the injustices that they suffer. He really laid out that theory. He studied in Europe in the late 1950s and the 1960s and then returned to Latin America. And he said when he returned to his parish, he was answering questions that they weren't asking. What he meant with that is that the church at the time didn't really address the problems

that the poor were experiencing. And he argued that the church should listen more to what these poor people were living in their daily lives and try to help them. Now it became very prominent that theory of liberation theology in the 70s and 80s across the region didn't it because right-wing governments, military governments, a lot of them, were coming down pretty hard on indigenous communities and poorer communities and yet liberation theologians try to push back. That's right and of course Gustavo Gutierrez had read the works of Karl Marx and Sigmund Freud and incorporated some of those ideas into his thinking and that's why he came under criticism not just from right-wing governments but also from Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict later on who reacted very strongly

against what they saw as a Marxist undercurrent there. But what people who follow liberation theology have always said is that it's not about Marxism, it's about meeting the needs, the spiritual needs and also the very real practical needs of the poor parishioners that they serve. Father Gutierrez often said that the poor were living, you know, they were a sign of the hope that they can have in times of need and of difficulty and that it should be the priests who should be learning from them. So bottom up rather than top down. I know there is an example of that to a certain extent anyway of what's been happening in Mexico. Police there have arrested a man accused of murdering a Catholic priest and a human rights campaigner in the state of Chiapas. What do we know about what happened there?

Absolutely right. That's Father Marcelo Pérez, who was a follower of liberation theology. Father Marcelo had been a priest in the rural areas of Chiapas in southern Mexico. He himself was of indigenous roots, he was a social indigenous person, and he very much followed liberation theology. In his daily ministry, he would talk to warring groups in Chiapas, he would talk to vigilante groups who were confronting drug gangs and try and reach some sort of peace for the local community, who of course are the ones who are suffering. And his life was in danger. He received death threats and he was moved to the state capital of San Cristobal de las Casas, but even that wasn't

enough. He was shot by gunmen on Sunday and now one of those presumed gunmen has been arrested after CCTV coverage was found and indicated that he was the man who opened fire on Father Marcelo. Vanessa Buschlita. Now what do you think might justify this kind of commotion? Baseball fans falling over each other in an attempt to grab a ball that had just been hit into the stands. A fairly standard, if a bit undignified display at a game. But this was not just any old home run.

It was hit by the American Major League star, the Japanese player, Shohei Otani. And it's just sold, the ball that is, for more than four million dollars. Here's Mickey Bristo. This player, this Japanese man, 30 years old Shohay Otani is perhaps the biggest player in baseball in America at the moment. Just to give you an indication of how important a player he is, he recently signed a 10 year deal with his team LA Dodgers for $700 million. I think that's the highest sporting contract there's been for anyone ever in the world.

So that's just an indication of how valuable a player he is. In this particular case, yes, you mentioned that this year he's become the first player in Major League Baseball to score 50 home runs and steal 50 bases. That's when a player moves from one base to another without anything else happening in the play. Nobody else has done that before. He's also a pitcher, so he also throws the ball. Now to be a hitter and a pitcher, those are very, a specialist task to be able to do both

is a real phenomenal achievement to do it at such a high level. So that's why he's a valuable player. That's why anything he touches, anything associated with him is so valuable too. And four million dollars was the sale price, a bit more in fact. And there's controversy over who was actually legally able to sell it. Yeah, the controversy started almost as soon as they hit that ball on the 50th home run. You can see video taken by people in the stands as the ball sails into the stands. It lands on the floor, it rolls under seats, and there's an almighty scramble bordering

on a fight really to get hold of the ball. A few people thought they had it. Then someone came up with it in their hand. Immediately or the next day, he put that up for sale through this auction house. But then there was a legal dispute because some of the people who thought they'd had the ball, first of all, they claimed it was rightfully theirs. It was resolved when the auction house itself stepped in, the person who runs the auction house said, look, if there's a legal dispute over this ball, it's not

going to be worth nearly as much because nobody's going to want to buy it when the ownership is in doubt. So that seemed to concentrate minds. People got together, the dispute was resolved, the sale went ahead. And as you say, it was sold for $4.4 million. So I'm presuming a certain number of fans are going to share that money. So this is a story not just about baseball, it's also a story about money. Mickey Brista. And we end the podcast with a bit of classical music. Ah, the elegance, the sophistication. But does it have a place in the future of music? Well, to the possible dismay of some listening, the grandson of Russian composer Sergei Prokofiev,

Gabriel, is using drum machines. DJ turntables and even bubble wrap to reinvent the genre. He calls it non-classical. Nicholas Stambridge has been finding out about its growing popularity. ["Turkish Folk Song"] Nicholas Stambridge has been finding out about its growing popularity. Surrounded by an unusual array of instruments in his studio, composer Gabriel Prokofiev is assembling a landmark contemporary classical showcase, including his concerto for turntables.

his concerto for turntables. My concept for that piece was to take phrases that the orchestra play and put them on the turntables, manipulate, reversing, scratching, playing back new textures and we even start to wonder what's turntables, what's orchestra. Interesting for classical music to be aware of things happening outside the classical world. Insisting that classical music can be performed outside concert halls keeps the classical music relevant to a wider part of the population. It means so much to work with an orchestra like the LSO, one of the greatest orchestras in the world, to be able to program a concert where all the composers are still alive. On the programme is Tonya Koh, inspired by the experimentalism of American composer John Cage,

and with a nod to plastics and the environment, she plays bubble rap. to plastics and the environment, she plays bubble wrap. For the orchestra part I decided to write it quite specifically so that the orchestra would be responding to the sounds that I made. However, for my own part, it's really quite free. I play bubble wrap as a friction instrument. I rub the bubble wrap with my hands. I don't necessarily pop much. And I never wanted to pop it, even as a kid. I do understand everyone wants to, so I sort of save it for dramatic moments.

Catherine McDowall is the managing director of the London Symphony Orchestra. The piece that has always shocked people, Stravinsky's Rite of Spring. I mean, there was a riot when that was first performed. Now it's a regular part of the repertoire. And what he did in extending what the instruments could do, the bassoonist who opens the Rite of Spring at the time was thought to be unplayable, whereas now it's core repertoire. And I've really noticed quite a change, and certainly the work that Nonclassical and Gabriel has done, has encouraged this, that it's been possible since the pandemic for us to programme the occasional concert

that is all contemporary music. I think it's also to do with what people are listening to on their phones. They pick from all different genres and it's no longer as fixed as it used to be. Performing with Nonclassical, the LSO will also play the first ever concerto for Drum Machine with composer Josephine Stevenson. In my movement of the piece, I'm using the drum machine, the step sequencer, there will be a pattern that's set and then that loops infinitely, changing which sounds are playing, which ones are muted, changing pattern.

I really tried to fit the music of the orchestra around what's going on in the drum machine, perhaps the most risky way, because if I do one thing wrong, potentially the whole thing crashes. Can you see a time when drum machines become a more regular part of the orchestra? Well, who knows? There have been periods over the centuries when the instruments of the orchestra did change and develop, it's really important that the composers who are the visionaries in many ways say, let's work in a new way. And it's important that an orchestra like the LSO remains open to all those possibilities.

That report was by Nicola Stambridge. And that's all from us for now, but there will be a new edition of the Global News podcast later. But before I go, I'm hosting a special edition of the podcast ahead of the UN's climate change conference, which starts next month. We want you to send in your questions to our experts to answer anything climate related and what the world is doing to try to address that problem. We've had questions from Brazil about how much pressure companies are under to meet their emissions targets and several of you want to know three simple things that we can all do to reduce our carbon footprint. Just send us a voice note with your question to

globalpodcast at bbc.co.uk. This edition was mixed by Joe McCartney and the producer was Alfie Habersham. The editor is Karen Martin. I'm Nick Miles and until next time, goodbye. believe it or not, changed the gaming industry forever. He went on to create Dungeons & Dragons. In the 50 years since its release, the tabletop roleplay game has generated billions of dollars in sales and now boasts more than 50 million players worldwide. Search and subscribe to witness history wherever you get your BBC podcast.