Media Storm - News Watch: Reform’s migrant lies, Global Sumud Flotilla sets sail, and is Rylan racist?

Episode Date: September 4, 2025

Media Storm is back! And it's time for another News Watch, helping you get your head around the headlines. This week saw the 10 year anniversary of the death of Alan Kurdi, the four-year-old refugee child who died attempting to flee the Syrian war along with his family. A photo of his tiny body washed up on the beach came to symbolise the global refugee crisis as a tragedy of humanity. But 10 years later, have we lost our compassion again? As the Reform party dominates political discourse, its players stir up anti-migrant sentiment, and the press helps to pump up misinformation, the far-right are weaponising feminism and women’s safety, to further their anti-immigration agenda… again. We say: not in our name. And beloved TV presenter Rylan rehashes far-right talking points on daytime television - we look at the most common immigration myths and why they're spreading so easily in the media. And as Mathilda prepares to set sail covering the actions of the Global Sumud Flotilla, we go behind the scenes of the biggest civilian fleet yet fighting to get humanitarian aid into Gaza. The episode is hosted and produced by Mathilda Mallinson (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@mathildamall⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠) and Helena Wadia (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@helenawadia⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠)  The music is by⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ @soundofsamfire⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Follow us on⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Instagram⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠,⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Bluesky⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, and⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ TikTok ⁠ Support us on⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Patreon⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Hulu original series Murdoch Death and the Family dives into secrets, deception, murder, and the fall of a powerful dynasty. Inspired by shocking actual events and drawing from the hit podcast, this series brings the drama to the screen like never before. Starring Academy Award winner Patricia Arquette and Jason Clark. Watch the Hulu original series Murdoch Death in the Family, streaming October 15th on Disney Plus. Hello, media stormers. Welcome back. And I say back very figuratively because wherever I am right now, I'm definitely not back. Yeah.

So if the recording doesn't sound studio quality, that's because neither of us are in a studio. Where are you, Heather? Okay. I am where I've been the majority of the summer, which is my flat inside these four walls. on the same chair on the same chair in the same place same big boot

in the same big boot because I broke my foot and would everybody like to hear the really interesting story of how I did it so basically what happened was I was walking the end

yeah so I just tripped and fell and broke four bones in my foot and so most of the summer I have just been literally here in one place so yes please send me all of your sympathy, because it's crazy how much you use your foot. Who would have thought? Are you now, like, afraid to walk again? Yes. Also, I have recurring nightmares about falling over

and tripping over and breaking my foot. Sorry, I shouldn't laugh. That's actually very sad. Yeah. So, I mean, if anyone's gotten a good physiotherapist, please reach out. Or is a physiotherapist and we'll is a physiotherapist, please reach out. Anyway, that's where I've been the majority of the summer and where I still am. Matilda, where are you? I am in Tunisia, and I actually am not allowed to say exactly where I am, which is because I am currently training for the global summered flotilla, and until it launches, it's got to be pretty secretive about its whereabouts, its plans,

It's logistics. The Simod Flotilla, for anyone who doesn't know, it is the fleet of humanitarian aid ships sailing to Gaza. You might have heard of the Freedom Flotilla, the Madeline ship that most famously carried Greta Thunberg in that direction a couple of months ago. Well, these ships have been very, very prone to sabotage. So, yeah, they're being pretty secretive about it,

and we will be setting sail on Friday, I think. We were due to set sail on Thursday. but it's been delayed by a storm. Now, you are joining that boat in your capacity as a journalist, and the second half of this episode, we're going to answer all of your questions about Matilda's role on the flotilla, the role of the flotilla itself. Yeah, I think that's really, really important

because there's going to be a lot of mixed messaging coming out, but I am here to see what's really going on and to get out a straight version of events because this is essentially a civilian, humanitarian mission and it's entirely peaceful and it's entirely legal but of course the context is very complicated so just before we kick off news watch we just want to say a big thank you to our listeners for being patient with us when we had to reschedule our latest episode and also listening to this podcast in not studio quality but don't worry when matilda is back and when

my foot is healed we will be back in the studio and we will be back in the studio and we we fully intend to bring you media storm next week, even though I will be streaming from a ship. That is how much we have missed you guys. So, coming up this news watch. The anniversary, the media missed. As the Reform Party dominates political discourse, its players stir up anti-migrant sentiment and the press helps to pump out misinformation, the far right are weaponising feminism and women's safety to further their anti-immigration agenda again. We say, not in our name. Ryland rehashes far-right talking points on daytime television

will tear them apart. And as Matilda prepares to set sail covering the actions of the global summed flotilla, we go behind the scenes of the biggest civilian fleet yet, fighting to get humanitarian aid into Gaza. Mass immigration is the biggest issue when it comes to women's safety in modern Britain. Here's the phones, here's the iPad,

Here's the NHS in reception of your hotel. So a shouting, send them back. A flotilla of boats leaving Barcelona trying to get aid to Gaza. There have been 38 previous attempts. This is unprecedented. Welcome to Media Storm's News Watch, helping you get your head around the headlines. I'm Helena Wadia. And I'm Matilda Mallinson.

This week's Media Storms, Reforms Migrant Lies, Global Sumid Flotilla set sail, and is Rylan racist? I want to start by marking an anniversary that went by without a whisper this week. I will soon be setting sail on the Mediterranean Sea, and this feels incredibly poignant for me, even beyond the extraordinary humanitarian mission that I'm reporting on. Why? Because Tuesday marked the 10-year anniversary of a tragedy in those waters and a photo that changed the world. Tuesday was the 2nd of September.

Exactly. And on the 2nd of September 2015, Alan Kurdi drowned in the Mediterranean. I'll explain who he was now for our younger listeners. We get lovely emails from 16-year-olds. And can you believe it? They would have been six when this happened. Okay, way to make me feel old. Sorry.

Yeah, it just feels so monumental in our memory. Yeah, I remember this so clearly, even though it was 10 years ago. So Alan Kurdi was a four-year-old refugee child, and he died as his family attempted to flee the Syrian war, along with his mother and brother. A Turkish journalist called Nilafer Demir took a photo of his body, washed up on the beach, tiny and lifeless. This is one of those rare photos that made the world stop in its tracks. There is no image more crushing and universally emotive. And it came to symbolise the global refugee crisis as a tragedy of humanity, not like today a security crisis.

You know, I have the strangest memory of seeing this photo, apart from seeing it on the front page of basically every newspaper. I also remember watching Gogglebox on Channel 4, and Gogglebox were watching the news report about this photograph. And I remember that every single person was crying. Regardless of their usual political affiliation, you know, you can tell on Gogglebox where people's politics lie. But at this point, every single person was watching that and crying.

Exactly. There's no one that this wouldn't reach the heart of. And so Tuesday this week, this was a day that the whole media, should have picked up on. Most of all, it could have been a moment of introspection because a lot has changed since that day 10 years ago when a viral photo caused a surge of compassion for refugees at sea. It wasn't just compassion. I feel like this was a moment of understanding. People put themselves in the shoes of refugees. It told a story of real desperation. Yeah, it was like that. It was this eureka experience. People felt this child's death.

almost like he was their child. So people realise that no parent would do this awful journey unless it was their only choice to give their child a good life. And it wasn't just public opinion, if I remember correctly, didn't policy change? Absolutely, massively. This photo temporarily shifted the global response to refugees after decades of deterrence-based policies.

Temporarily being the prerogative word there. Yeah. Arguably, this photo was a catalyst to Angela Merkel opening Germany's borders to a million refugees. What isn't mentioned in that sort of sweeping analysis is it was also a pretty opportunistic bid for working age men by a rapidly aging population. But look, some argue this sudden wave of immigration to Germany opened the floodgates to chaos, crime and political discord in a country that is now, seeing the return of fascism after paying the heaviest price for Nazism. There is maybe some truth to the fact that this ushering in of immigration was not supported by parallel systems to support those coming in and to support integration. Still, there are massive issues with that analysis.

Namely? Well, for example, the most far-right areas of Germany today, those are areas with relatively low levels of immigration, like Daringia and Saxony. Saxony has actually historically suffered from emigration, not immigration. Wait, what? Yeah, so the correlation between the rise of the far right and like immigration levels, no, that's not the correlation. The correlation is between the rise of the far right and far right propaganda. Okay, so a lot of today's mainstream media. Yes, which brings us back to Tuesday's anniversary, because on that day, we should have been forced to look in the mirror at how far we've fallen.

Right. How did we get here? Now, I think I'd probably read more news than the average person. And I don't remember reading this in the news. Like, you telling me that this is the 10-year anniversary of his death is the first time I'm kind of hearing this. So did you see it in the media at all? No, it's so sad. There was almost no coverage at all.

Now look, okay, I started preparing for this anniversary months ago because normally on a Tuesday I present a live news show at Middle East Eye. So I was like, great, I can dedicate the whole show to this. They were all for it. However, obviously, I was then dispatched on the flotilla and it became impossible to produce a show that day. But when I knew I couldn't mark that day in the media, I guessed there would be only two mainstream outlets

that would acknowledge it. The Guardian and the Independent. And were you right? I was right about the Independent, not the Guardian. Wow. I know. It is quite heartbreaking. Like if you search Alan Kurdi on your Google News tab, set the date to Tuesday,

there is like one measly page of results. Two of those were from the Independent. The only other two articles published. One was by an Iranian channel and a non-profit news platform called Geneva Solutions. Which is exactly why we needed this day to reflect on why we have abandoned our compassion when it literally took seeing a dead child's body to feel it in the first place. Can I just ask, you said you'd expected the Guardian to publish?

Well, so would I. But why would you expect the Independent to? I genuinely expected the Independent to remember this anniversary because of one journalist who I have followed at the Independent for a long time. Ooh, who? Do we know them? No. I mean, I don't anyway. But yeah, I followed her for years. Her name is May Borman. And she was the independent social affairs correspondent until fairly recently, I guess. She actually doesn't work there anymore. Google tells me she's moved on to a non-mainstream investigative outlet.

Woo-hoo, non-mainstream. Yeah. But look, for a long time, she pioneered, I would say, in the mainstream media. She was single-handedly one of my most reliant reporters on UK refugee and asylum news. She would break stories based in fact and firsthand interviews, not just speculative, racist, clickbait. Now, the two reporters at the Independent who published these articles this week were different. Daniel Keane and Holly Bishop, well done them. But given the years that May shaped the independence domestic coverage and the multiple awards she won them doing so.

I suspect this is part of her legacy. It actually goes to show just how much difference one person can make. Yeah. And also that you can make a difference, like inside the institution or outside. Yeah. I mean, we tried inside and we all know how that went. Yeah, it didn't last too long either. But you never know.

Well, thank you, Mabelman, I guess, for giving us some faith. Yes, and thank you also to the independent for being the only mainstream outlet who took a single second to reflect on how in just 10 years we descended from a wave of desperately needed compassion for refugees, especially those at sea, into deportation ASMR videos and front page pledges to extract asylum seekers by the plane load. This question about lost humanity, It was asked by Alan Kurdi's father, Abdullah, on the five-year anniversary of his son's death. And this week, the Independent republished that. Here's what he said.

Europe started caring about refugees and opened its doors. But unfortunately, it was for a very short time, maybe a month or two. And then they closed the doors again. It is really serious. sad to see that we are back to the same old rhetoric. The front pages are splashed with sweeping statements about deportation and mass immigration with very little fact-checking and often zero context. I will give some specific examples in a minute, but first I want to point out some of the common myths and tropes that we're all reminded of them and how we can

counter them. Now, first of all, a key part of successful scapegoating of an entire group is to create fear and Nigel Farage and the Reform Party who as we've pointed out on this podcast before have four MPs in the House of Commons so are getting a disproportionate amount of media exposure yes a very good point well reform and those four MPs are doing a pretty damn good job of stoking up fear and division and their latest obsession is stoking up fear around women's safety At a press conference in August, Reform MP Sarah Pochin suggested that migrants and refugees have a warped view of their right to sexually assault women.

What? She claimed that men from predominantly Muslim countries like Afghanistan hold a medieval view of women's rights and that women are at risk of sexual assault and rape from these men. Now, not only is there no evidence of this, There is no evidence that asylum seekers are more likely to harm women and girls than British citizens. In fact, data shows that the vast majority of rapes are committed by white Brits. These are racist narratives that have been attached to Muslim men in particular for decades.

This idea that scary men are coming over here and attacking women and girls is not just a racist narrative, though. It also perpetuates the stranger danger narrative of sexual violence. The idea that sexual violence is only committed by scary evil men who jump out of bushes, whereas in reality, most rapes are carried out by former or current partners and 90% of femicide killers are known to the victim. Abuse within the family accounts for almost half of all child sexual abuse offences. And when Farage and his MPs use attacks on women to stoke an anti-migrant agenda,

They are ignoring the real crisis of violence against women in the UK. Not just ignoring, but diverting away from it. So how do we counter this? Not only by dismantling these racist and sexist tropes, but also by calling out Reform's track record on tackling violence against women and girls. Because if you really care about women's safety, you'll prioritise women, right?

Right. And we know that reform has consistently, completely failed to put forward a serious policy on male violence against women, even when questioned. Farage himself, didn't he say he doesn't even know what the word feminist means? And he called Andrew Tate, self-proclaimed misogynist and accused rapist and sex trafficker, an important voice for men. Exactly. He's said that women who take time off work to have children are worth far less to their employers. He's aligned himself with US anti-abortion campaigners. He defended Trump's grab-and-by-the-pussy comment.

Plus, so many more disgusting displays of misogyny we don't even have time to cover. But that's Farage. What about those four reform MPs I mentioned earlier? Well, one of them was convicted in 2006 of assaulting his ex-girlfriend. I didn't know that. And you want to stand up for women and girls.

I mean, additionally, reform pledged to replace the Equality Act 2010 and scrap the protections that underpin women's rights in law. Earlier this year, Farage and his MPs voted against the bill aimed at preventing workplace sexual harassment. They also voted against legislation to tackle stalking, to tackle upskirting, to tackle drink spiking, and legislation to tackle image-based sexual abuse. And why? Because Nigel Farage and Reform MPs don't really care about protecting women.

They care about dog whistling about immigration so that they can prey on vulnerable people so that they can get those vulnerable people's votes under the guise of care. And it is up to all of us to say loudly that the issue of women's safety should not be hijacked for political hate speech. This is such a common trope, and I can't believe we haven't learnt this lesson. I mean, remember the Southpour incident last year, Helena, you did a really powerful news watch on it at the time, because the horrendous murder of three girls at a dance class was, again, entirely hijacked for racist misinformation, right? False information immediately spread rapidly that the murderer was a Muslim asylum seeker. he was not. But riots ensued. Mosques were attacked. People of colour couldn't leave the house

safely. All done, what, under the guise of protecting our women and girls? But do you want to hear something even more telling about what followed the Southport murders? And this is a story I think did not get the media attention it deserved. These people were rioting last summer because, as you said, apparently they were so outraged about women's safety. But two in five, of those arrested for last year's Summers' riots had been previously reported to the police for domestic abuse. Two in five. And thank you to the Guardian for gathering that data,

but the irony is unmissable that many of the men who claimed to be protesting about the savage murders of three little girls had themselves been accused of attacking women. The link between private and public violence, is so often overlooked. I'm so shocked to hear that, but depressingly, I'm not surprised. And what I'm worried about is how easily reform are controlling the narrative on immigration,

how quickly they are being given a massive amount of media attention with so little scrutiny. And that brings me on to the media. Now, sometimes on this podcast, we have to. to eat our words. And back in series one, I praised TV presenter Ryland as a national treasure after he was the victim of an unfair media expose about drugs. But unfortunately, it seems like Ryland is now a victim to falling for some of the worst dog whistles and myths about immigration. Have a listen to what he said recently on ITVs this morning. A lot of the nurses, the doctors that have saved my mum's life have come over here from other countries and living a great life, they're paying into this tax system, they're helping this country thrive.

I find it absolutely insane that all these people, one, a risk in their lives coming across the channel like that they are, but two, when they get here, it does seem, welcome, come on in, here's, this is the narrative we're being fed, here's the hotel, here's the phones, here's the iPad, here's the NHS in reception of your house, hotel. Here's three meals a day. Here's a games room in the hotel. Have a lovely time and welcome. And then there's people that have lived here all their lives that are struggling. Yeah. Because let me be honest. Everyone's going to have an opinion about this and you're going to upset someone some which way. I believe that something major needs to be done about this. The money that is costing us, the amount of people that are in this country that we have no idea who they are, what they've done, what they're capable of. How can, if I turn up at Heathrow airport as a British citizen and I've left my passport in Spain. I've got to stand at that

airport and won't be let in and got to get this. But if I arrive on a boat in Calais, I get taken to a four-star hotel. Oh, Helena, you're a hero. Yeah, sorry, no longer national treasure, Ryland. I take those words back. But listen, I don't necessarily blame Ryland for falling for these myths. Slightly blame him for repeating them on national TV to an audience of millions. Yes, exactly, yes. And what I find most interesting, actually, is when he said, this is the narrative we're being fed. I'm like, exactly, Ryland, you're being fed it. And now you're just parroting reform talking points on national TV with a shrug of, well, this is what people are saying and just framing it like it's an opinion and like not his fault if

are offended by what he's saying. Like, dude, that is not balance. It's unfortunately legitimising the false claims that asylum seekers get given this special treatment. And yeah, like you said, Ryland has a national platform. And having that platform means you also have a duty to think about the consequences of what you are saying. And Ryland's misinformed, exaggerated, factually incorrect and unchecked speech was praised by none other than Tommy Robinson. He said that Ryland was speaking the most common sense ever spoken. Now, you'd think that maybe this would cause Ryland to think twice about what he said,

but instead he put out a lazy statement saying you can still be pro-immigration and against illegal routes. Okay, babes. It's just the ignorance is astounding. I used to think, okay, I get it's kind of complicated. people don't understand the law on this, but how many times do people have to say that it is not illegal to claim refugee and asylum? It is enshrined in international human rights law, to which the UK is not only subscribed, it was a founding member. There are no safe and legal

routes. These do not exist, basically, unless you're Ukrainian. You cannot make an asylum application to the UK until you are in the UK. And some people have to come to the UK, because guess what? The world's poorest countries, those closest to the regions of conflict, they are carrying the burden of global displacement by themselves. And this is a burden that is as much the UK's responsibility as anyone else, because guess what? Climate change. Guess what? Post-colonial conflict and devastation and economic exploitation, there are some 20, million refugees across the world. And the UK takes in some of the lowest numbers in Europe, especially wealthy Europe.

And listen, while we're on the takedowns of the many myths that Ryland spelted, here are some more facts. People seeking asylum are not entitled to any state benefits. They're able to claim asylum support of just under £50 a week. Also, asylum seekers are not legally allowed to work, which means they're not legally allowed to pay taxes. And this is a huge cause of depression for many who campaign for the right to contribute to the UK economy rather than living off what many call handouts. Exactly. Another myth to counter. Asylum seekers cannot choose which area of the UK they want to live in and they do not get priority housing. All of these riots outside hotels, they have no choice. There is no entitle. There is no entitle

to council or housing association accommodation. We also heard Rylan say asylum seekers are given the NHS in the reception of your hotel. Asylum seekers can use the NHS like anyone in this country can, waiting times and all. But Rylan is implying that there are dedicated NHS services set up in the reception of asylum hotels. Well, once again, that is false. Yeah, Rylan also said that asylum seekers get handed. phones. Nope. Asylum seekers are not routinely provided with smartphones by the home office. Some charities might give out secondhand handsets to those who need them to communicate, say,

with a lawyer or family back home, but no taxpayer money is used to pay for phones for refugees. As for Ryland saying they get handed iPads, like, girl, where are you getting your information? That's just like hilariously untrue. And Tommy Robinson says this is the most common. sense ever. And finally, it's an unavoidable reality that every Western country will have to spend money on asylum in some way. You cannot stop people fleeing war, fleeing persecution. It is a fact of life that people will move countries. And every country would still be spending money on asylum seekers, even if it is to turn them away. So the question is really, how should we spend our money? and the UK spends so long processing claims that we have to spend money to house the people who are waiting for asylum.

And by the way, the money that we spend on asylum, it's about 0.2% of our budget. These are the kind of facts that I actually think they should be printed in every single newspaper in a story about immigration just because of how widespread these misconceptions are. I mean, it's embarrassing to a media that has miseducated. its population so poorly. That is also, by the way, what someone should have said on this morning after Ryland finished his rant. Instead, we get uncritical, unscrutonized claims flying wildly. And the whole point of mainstream, you know, media is that you have journalists who are qualified to tackle it. Talking about unscrutonized claims, I'm thinking of something you sent me recently from The Times. Oh my God. No. I'd all.

almost managed to erase that from my brain. Sorry, not yet. First, please share with the class. Okay, so I was hanging out with my grandma, who is genuinely an absolute legend. I love her so much. But listen, she is nearly 90. So naturally, our views on a few topics differ. And probably where we differ the most is that she just buys and reads the Times. So I picked up her copy of the Times when I was hanging out with her. And what do I see? But a front-page interview with Nigel Farage. The headline.

Farage will pledge five deportation flights a day. The sub-headline. Reform leader says 10 billion pound plan will save money. A few lines in. The Reform UK leader says Britain is facing a massive crisis and that the only way forward is to detain and deport all migrants who arrive illegally. No context, no facts, no pushback. So many of the sentences in this interview start with reform will do X, reform will do Y, with no mention of how they plan to if it's even

possible or what it will mean for the public. The interview is continued on page two. I open the paper to page two, thinking this can't get worse. Except it is a double page. photo shoot of Farage, doing cutesy photo booth style poses, sipping a tea, laughing and looking up, pulling a silly face. A mainstream media paper is literally cutifying a far right figure, awarding this man three front pages in an, I'm just a fun loving guy type of photo shoot. I mean, I sent it to you. It was, it's odd. It's bizarre. It is just like Nigel fraud selfie session. I don't know how to explain it. It's so horrible and so inappropriate. Yeah, I mean, it's like a PR piece and the photos give it the semblance of like a magazine feature

about the icon of the dime, except the words coming out of his mouth are deeply, deeply sinister. Exactly. Just to bring this full circle, that little body washed up on the shores 10 years ago, that is who they're talking about when they talk about illegal migrants because Alan Curdie and his family were attempting to cross into Europe without papers trying to claim asylum

the only way available to them. So to round off this first part of Newswatch it can feel like at the moment that everyone is so divided and everything is so bleak and that is why we need to continue questioning what we read. At the beginning of this year, another example, the Telegraph's front page read one in 12 in London is an illegal migrant. They have just been ruled by Ipso to have completely

inaccurately calculated that statistic. Now, of course, they'll just print a little correction and brush past it, but we don't have to let media misinformation slide. And the way that we do that is really knowing what is distraction and what is fact. You could deport every asylum seeker in this country right now and your problems would not go away. There would still be inequality. There would still be a housing crisis. There would still be a cost of living crisis.

There would still be low wages. There would still be male violence against women. And people like Farage would still get richer and richer. And the super rich, like Farage, they're sitting at the top and they're looking down at everyone below, fighting each other for scraps. and they're laughing because everyone is blaming

the most vulnerable groups for problems they didn't cause and no one is looking up and blaming people like Farage. Immigration is not causing your problems. Inequality is. With the RBC Avion Visa, you can book any airline,

any flight, any time. so start ticking off your travel list. Grand Canyon? Grand. Great Barrier Reef? Great. Galapagos? Galapagos? Switch and get up to 55,000 Avion points that never expire. Your idea of never missing out happens here. Conditions apply. Visit rbc.com slash avion. Welcome back to.

to Media Storm's Newswatch. Now let's turn to Tunisia, where Matilda is about to head off for day two of training in preparation to join the Global Sumad Flotilla. That is right. So remind us, Matilda, what is the Global Sumid Flotilla? Listeners probably heard of the Freedom Flotilla after Greta Thunberg sailed with it a few months ago with humanitarian aimed for Gaza. Now, that ship was intercepted and the passengers were detained by Israel, as were several other missions organized by the same broad coalition of humanitarian organizations that started this work after Israel intensified its blockade of the Gaza Strip back in 2007.

In 2007? Yeah. That was the year that Hamas took over Gaza and Israel, which was already partially blockading the strip, really clamped down. Now, as you've mentioned, floatillers have tried to get to Gaza before. and it wasn't just the Madeleine ship that Greta Thunberg went on in June. There was another in July that ended the same way and one just before that that was attacked by drones.

All of them carried aid for Gaza. None of them made it. So why are they trying again? Well, they would say, why is the genocide still happening? And the thing is that there weren't even just those three missions. There have been 37 civilian, maritime missions to get aid into Gaza since 2007. And the first thing to know is some of them succeeded.

In 2008, two boats from the Free Gaza Movement successfully reached the Strip, marking the first breach of Israel's naval blockade. However, since 2010, all flotillas have been intercepted or attacked by Israel in international waters. and in 2010, Israeli commandos raided the Mavi Madmara ship, also in international waters, killing 10 of the activists on board. So, why keep going? It's a good question. Ultimately, what the people I'm meeting here, what they desperately want is to get to Gaza. And if that happens, they have a local coordination and plan to distribute the aid being carried by these ships. The main function of having civilians from all over the world, a company that aid, is to provide it with political protection. But it's not just about political protection, right? It's also about political pressure.

Yes, definitely. The common strand that participants have told me about why they are doing this is that their governments are not. As of early last year, there has also been a legal obligation on all countries party to the International Court of Justice to act to prevent. genocide in Gaza. This includes the UK, who still, for example, provide F-35 fighter jet parts to Israel. So there's a genuine will of the people to do something. But from the organizers' perspective, I can see why you would ask, why keep trying? And what they told me with the last mission was that as long as the blockade continues, they will continue fighting it. Because if their message isn't continuous, if they give in to pressure from Israel, then it's meaningless. And I think there's a sense, understandably, that doing nothing might mean this never ends. But also, finally, this mission

is different to previous ones, because it is the biggest by a mile. It is bigger, they tell me, than all of the previous 37 missions combined. Hundreds will be sailing, from almost 50 countries. And from Tunisia, I can vouch for that. For yesterday's training, three times the anticipated number turned up. There were almost 400 people crammed into a room and most of them won't be able to sail

because that is more people than there are places on the ships. Wow. Wow. Yeah, it was really quite something to see. Okay, so maybe this is a more personal question from me as your friend, but you've told us that people have died trying to do this before. So why are you personally doing this? I'm not going to pretend that that was an easy decision. Honestly, I am scared.

I don't want to meet harm. I love my life. I already miss my husband so much. Yeah, I'm scared. But I am also more scared of a world where we let fear eradicate justice. There are reasons I became a journalist. and when Middle East I asked me to cover this, I ultimately decided for two reasons. One is that as a journalist, I feel this is a historic story and it should be witnessed and reported on as such.

It's a remarkable phenomenon. I have seen it up close. Teachers, doctors, lawyers, activists, teenagers, ordinary civilians from all over the world, so sick of government inaction that they are putting, their safety on the line, to do it themselves. I do see my role on this flitilla as a journalist, not an activist in the same way of many of the others. That's just the value that I have. But if I have a personal protest to make

by putting my body in the firing line, it is this. Our Palestinian colleagues in Gaza are being wiped out. They are being targeted. At least 220 by modest counts have been killed in what is now the deadliest war for journalists in recorded history. And so much of our media, it feels like they just sit back and do nothing for the greatest of our kind who have given their lives in the service of truth,

who should never have had to give their lives at all. Helena, before we started this season, you had this idea that we had to introduce into every Media Storm episode a segment platforming their work, helping them to shine a light on the horrors around them. You've felt a need to archive this reality. A reality so many powerful people are trying to keep hidden. This, for me, is a way of doing that.

And tell us what is the likely outcome? So there's four possible or likely scenarios. The first is bureaucratic failure. Something goes wrong with the planning or it's sabotaged or maybe the weather Already, it's been delayed due to a storm. Statistically, the most likely outcome is interception. Israel's equivalent navy seals, they will board the ships, take the vessels, round everyone on board into detention and ultimately deport us. Third, attack.

This is why the training that I'm doing now is so important. We are practicing non-violent resistance and de-escalation. We will carry only aid, nothing that can be constituted as a weapon. This is a pacifist mission. Anyone not obliging by that will be disqualified from sailing. Some people already have been. This is very serious for everyone's safety. And finally, the last possible outcome.

And the whole room burst into applause and some people tears at the mention of this. entry to Gaza and delivery of the aid. And let's clarify something about the aid, because the basis of this mission is to break through the blockade on Gaza and get humanitarian aid to its population. This has been urgent since Israel fully blocked all aid and trade into the enclave in May. But over the past month, there have been reports that Israel finally bowed to international pressure and began allowing aid back in.

So what is the situation? Is there or is there not aid getting into Gaza? That's a really important question. In a nutshell, when those reports first appeared at the end of July, people in Gaza reported that they had read about aid entering Gaza in Western media. They had not seen any aid coming in. The reason is that Israel has only partially lifted the blockade. However, they have partially lifted it. They are allowing significantly. more aid trucks into Gaza than they were while the full blockade was in place. However, it's not nearly enough. It's about half of what was coming in before the May blockade. And the thing is, now Gaza needs more than they did before, because famine has already set in. So the world's leading hunger monitor officialised it just over a week ago. Half a million people, a quarter of Palestinians in Gaza, are suffering from famine. The hunger. The hunger, related death toll has surpassed 360 people.

Gaza needs to be flooded with aid. This is undoubtedly an aid crisis and it's manmade. And finally, Israel is calling the flotilla an illegal attempt to break its blockade and using anti-terror language. A religious Israeli news outlet called it, and I quote, an international jihadist conspiracy. So tell us, where does the... the law actually stand on this mission? Under international law, it is Israel's blockade that is

considered illegal. Meanwhile, the flotilla has thoroughly established its legality under both international humanitarian law and international maritime law. We will actually be joined on the journey by a team of lawyers. Here are just a few examples of legal statutes enshrining the rights of civilians on this mission. The UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. It gives all ships carrying national flags the right to navigate the high seas. Interception is only allowed if that ship engages in piracy, slave trade, pirate radio, like the boat that rocked, or it's stateless. It doesn't have a flag. For this flotilla, none of those apply. The Geneva Convention, that's human rights law, that also mandates the free passage of necessary aid relief, right? So civilians

have the right to navigate the high seas, and they have the right to deliver aid as it's needed. Also, civilians should be protected during armed conflicts, during maritime operations, according to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other laws. On the other hand, let's look at Israel's blockade on Gaza. Starvation as a weapon of war, the deliberate deprivation of food, medicine and essential supplies to a civilian population. This is a serious international crime. The International Court of Justice has already issued three provisional measures ordering Israel to ensure basic provisions go to Gaza. They are obliged to facilitate relief actions like this flotilla. And as I intend to verify on my own ship, these ships will carry only humanitarian aid.

Now, if we are intercepted, it will probably be shortly after next week's Media Storm. So I will bring you all the updates then, and you better make sure you tune in. Thank you for listening. Next week, we'll be back with another Newswatch. Stay tuned. If you want to support MediaStorm, you can do so on Patreon for less than a cup of coffee a month. The link is in the show notes and a special shout-out to everyone in our Patreon community already. We appreciate you so much. If you enjoyed this episode, please send it to someone. Word of mouth is still the best way to grow a podcast, so please do tell your friends.

And obviously leave us a five-star rating and a review. You can follow us on social media at Matilda Mao, at Helen Awadier, and follow the show via at MediaStorm Pod. MediaStorm is an award-winning podcast produced by Helena Wadia and Matilda Mallinson. The music is by Samfire.