Hello, and welcome to the programme which brings together some of the uks leading columnists with foreign correspondents who write for the folks back home with the dateline london. This week is this the beginning of the end for israels longest serving Prime Minister . And is this the end of the beginning for a brexit deal . With me arejonathan sacredoti, a political commentator and broadcaster in the uk. Jeffrey kofman, a canadian born broadcaster. Maria margaronis writes for the nation, charted the effects of greeces financial crisis, and has made radio documentaries on migrantsjourneying from africa to europe. And yasmin al bhai brown. Born in uganda, herfamily was one of thousands expelled by idi amin. Shes now a british newspaper columnist. A warm welcome to all of you, good to have you back with us. Israels newspaper front pages this weekend are not the ones Benjamin Netenyahu was probably expecting. After the second indecisive election in five months, power is described as slipping away. Himself alone and political death spasms are among the headlines. Prime minister for the last ten years, with a three year stint before that in the 1990s, mr netanyahu, hes been reduced to urging benny gantz, the ex army chief who leads the newish centrist party blue and white, the largest in the knesset after tuesdays poll, to join a unity government. Gantz told him to push off. This in a week when iran, a country the israeli Prime Minister regularly invokes in elections as a reason why it needs a strong government, was blamed by the United States for halving Saudi Oil Production with two drone attacks, claimed by Houthi Rebels in neighbouring yemen. Before we talk about all of that, jonathan, just talk about Benjamin Netanyahus fate. Do you think we are now witnessing the end of the netanyahu era . We definitely could be. But it also may not be. I think it is important at this stage that we think about it in that way. Because netanyahu has not done as well as he would have hoped. These elections were elections he did not want. The kingmaker, lieberman, pulls the elections and then failed tojoin the coalition. It is not looking good for netanyahu, but he has proven that he is still a smart player when it comes to making coalitions. He got all the right wing parties and religious parties to agree to sign an agreement for coalition talks. That puts him in a slightly stronger position because it means that effectively he has a block of 55 behind him and you need 61 to form the coalition. If we take every party on face value and the system in israel with other smaller parties playing the balance, there is a problem. Because so far, no one will sit with anyone. And if you put together the equation of who will not sit with who, there is no solidarity. For this to happen, certain people wont sit with the arabist parties because they are so extreme. Certain people wont sit with the ultra 0rthodoxjewish parties because they are extreme in a different way. It means that someone is going to have to break their promise and that will be where we find the coalition. That can still be neta nyahus coalition. Having to deal with all this politics. It is so complicated. I have to be honest, i look forward to the day when he goes, because he has been. Ijust think he has been such bad news. It has taken him to really bring deep pessimism to the area. Almost irrecoverable pessimism. I think that is a tragedy. People dont even talk about a two state solution any more. He has taken away the hope and i could never forgive him for that. So i hope it is not him, whoever it is. Would benny gantzs party be much different or even better . Yes and no. A lot of palestinians are saying at least we already know the devil in netanyahu. His campaign has been about expanding territory. And this new party did appear almost from nowhere. Taking into account all the up and down politics in israel and palestine, it has been considerably destructive. I think that is one of the interesting things with netanyahu because we hear that a lot from people outside of israel. The elections were not about expanding territory, he has always been about mr security. Sure, that plays a part, but on the other hand he has brought a certain amount of economic success to the country. He has had relative peace within the country, relatively few wars compared to israels history. He has defended well against the terror front and he stood up against 0bama who was for eight years a very critical us president against him. He has now got very close ties to president trump. But thats the problem. Close ties with saudi arabia under the radar. His desire to survive seems less about israel and more about him. This is a man who is facing serious bribery and corruption charges. Which he denies. But if he is able to stay in office, there is the possibility of immunity, so for him it is not just about his legacy continuing, it is about protecting himself from serious consequences. It has become so normative. What has been happening in gaza in the last three or four years is unspeakable. And we have not talked about it here. Partly because of this ridiculous definition that was forced upon us that we may not discuss some of these issues. Come on. No, it is awful. The problem in gaza is not one sided. You have a population led by terrorists under the thumb of hamas. You do not shoot 12 year olds. The problem of gaza is not one sided. Bring it back to the election. To yank this conversation back to where it began, what is interesting in an era where we wonder if democracy can stand the kind of assaults we are seeing in the us and some of the gamesmanship we are seeing here in westminster, i think we can take some comfort to know that, in fact, pendulums in democracy do swing and there is a resilience in the israeli system. For all of his aggressive gaming of the systems to hold on to power and the extremism that he articulated in the last weeks of the campaign hes not actually able to do this. Whether or not he survives, the fact that we see this possibility of change, to me, is a sign of optimism in reading what is a sea of anxiety in democratic countries. In the wider picture, unless there is a settlement for the palestinians, both israel and the palestinians face a future much like the past or worse. And if we have both potential Prime Ministers netanyahu and benny gantz both promising to annex thejordan valley, which makes a two state solution extremely difficult because it is the main agricultural area for the palestinians, where does that leave us . I think that is a perfectly valid analysis. The reason why there has not been a two state solution that is the refusal of the palestinians. I think that this deadlock in the process is one that has forced israelis to prioritise other things. I think where it leaves us is where we are. The sobering reality is that no one is invested enough in a resolution to this conflict that we are going to see a change in the next number of decades. I think it is going to muddle on like this with flare ups and tensions and intermittent wars. The annexation is not a kind of side product of what is going on. It is an ambition, and ambition that they are pushing. And the world is allowing this to happen. Is this just electoral policy . I do not think so. It has been going on for a long time. And the criticism has vanished. Lets talk about the other country that jonathan mentioned. Netanyahus success in building relations with countries like saudi arabia below the wire. We hear that us troops are heading to their region. The secretary of state and bin salman have been talking about this. What is your take coming after the attacks . Listen, the interesting thing about watching donald trump is that he is a schoolyard bully and we know that he likes to threaten and brandishes his weapons. But i think ultimately what we are seeing is that he does not actually want to create a confrontation. The threat from iran is if you attacked us, then game on, i think, this very odd comment from trump when this happened saying we are waiting for our instruction from saudi arabia, that is extraordinary for our president of the United States to say. Any other president would have been demolished for this kind of thing. I think he is not going to do anything unless someone initiates it. He has been blind to bin salmans flaws. The khasoggi journalist assassination, he does not want to know about that. He will do anything to maintain relationship. I think there is also the question that gets away from us in this is iran. It is a huge regional threat. If people are worrying about donald trump, they ought to be much more worried about the iranians. They said any response to any American Military action will not be constrained to the source, meaning, they will spread it around. On that point of saudi arabia and iran, a bbc correspondent said saudi arabia does not want to get into a war with iran. It does not see it as an attractive option. It likes to maintain this kind of stand off. The last thing it wants is a direct confrontation. Generally speaking, the iranians have said they do not want a war, but they will defend themselves. Some senior figures have said they will wipe out saudi arabia. We do not want to take them seriously. One of them has a responsibility of sponsoring terrorism around the world. It is notjust in saudi arabia. One of the things is what is the meaning ofjohn bolton . I have not been able to. Is there a meaning . There must be he was a hawk, wasnt he . If we agree that it was probably around that did the strikes, coming so soon afterjohn bolton left, it seems very much a game of chess. They are saying to your hawk is left, and you have made it clear that you are not going to do very much. Trump is somebody who does not want war. He came to power. Iran and saudi arabia, saudi arabia is so shocking what is going on. What has been done to their own people. In both countries. Executions, imprisonment, that human rights violations. It was notjust khashoggi. There was a report on the number of executions this year alone and saudi arabia including six children. But what do you do . I think iran isjust as bad. And i have to make my feminist point. These are all men actually all vile, awful men in these countries, in america, in our country who are actually taking us step by step towards a catastrophe. I think given that yesterday we had millions of people, children and young people on friday we had massive protests around the world about the climate catastrophe. So we have not mentioned that little 3 letter word, oil. It seems to me that this is a moment where we have to recognise that oil is not only destroying the planet, but it is the cause and has been the cause of terrible wars, terrible conflicts. This is a moment to grasp that and say we have to shift a way. Well said. There is one other thing that is important to note. We are sitting here in london and i think iran has been extremely aggressive towards the uk in recent months. Im talking about the imprisonment of uk nationals. The behaviour with the iranian tanker that was released from gibraltar, and on a pledge from the iranians that it would not go to syria to sell oil which is exactly what it did. They have lied, they have developed secret nuclear weapons. It is strange that britain is not positioning itself into a slightly more serious stance. The grand duchy of luxembourg is one of europes smallest countries. Just 2,500 kilometres of land are bordered by belgium, france and germany. It has a reputation for being both wealthy and a little dull. On monday, though, it was so noisy with anti brexit protesters, that borisjohnson, the british Prime Minister, decided not to stay to be heckled in the sunshine at what should have been a joint News Conference with the grand duchys Prime Minister. Yet after the luxembourgois president of the eu commission, Jean Claude Juncker gave an interview to British Television on thursday, the pre brexit gloom seemed to lighten. We can have a deal, he declared. By friday, mrjohnsons brexit secretary was in brussels talking with the eus chief negotiator michel barnier. Maria, the Sterling Rose to i think a 2 year high just on the back of this announcement. Could it be, whisper it softly, that we might be heading towards a brexit deal . A lot of people are making a lot of money on these currency fluctuations. I have no idea if we are moving towards a brexit deal. Barnier has since said that the personal goals set forward are not concrete. This bubble about media discourse about brexit has moved so far away from the reality of what is happening in this country, as has the politics. Both major parties are tearing themselves apart. The labour party has been in this tremendous row over the deputy leader tom watson. Which is somehow connected to brexit. It is connected to brexit. All these rows go back a long way. Ijust keep longing for some political leader to come out and say, look, this brexit thing has become a metaphor for Everything Else that has gone wrong for austerity, for poverty, for peoples feeling of having no agency in politics. We are barking up. It should should be a 4 letter word rather than a 6 letter word. How many times did we sit around this table when theresa may saying that maybe shes going to pull the rabbit out of the hat . Many, many times. I am very sceptical. Maybe, but what i think this is really about all sides posturing so that whatever the outcome on october sist, they are not accused of not trying. And i think it is about seeing to be trying. Maybe it is true, maybe brinksmanship will resolve something. There is another part of this calculation. The word deal is going to put off all those supporters of the brexit party. Crosstalk what nigel farage has said he wants a deal, but he hasjust removing the backstop is not enough. He would prefer no deal to theresa mays minus the backstop. I think there is a big difference. The word deal is connected to may. Boris johnson cannot say this is the deal without this or without that. I do not know what happens next. It will only intensify. I think there is an election coming. I dont know who to vote for any more. He does not control that decision. Under that ridiculous fixed Time Parliament act, this is why legislation should never be made to satisfy one coalition. Because we now have a Prime Minister who has lost the majority that he could have had, a majority of 40 something, trapped in office by the labour party. He cut off his own arm, lets say. Left with a leader of the opposition who let this week poll the lowest Approval Rating since epps as marie started poling that. The opposition can trap in offers a Prime Minister who cant actually govern. He is now stuck in his position where the country is the one that will suffer because there is no government to be able to make laws on anything. Never mind brexit. There is an opposition who will not allow a general election for the people to even choose because presumably they are afraid of leaving or dont want to deal with the mess themselves. Then they should take offence and perhaps. Office. Perhaps the first thing he can do is stop shutting down parliament when it does not suit him. That is such an authoritarian decision. He lied. Im sorry, he lied about why he took that decision. Well, the government say he didnt. Well, of course they say he didnt but this happened to the oldest democracy in the world. Ive just been in africa and they were saying to me, 0ur leaders are going to follow boris johnson. One of the interesting things is that boris is increasingly trying to prove that he can bring about no deal in order to bring about a better deal in negotiations. If that is true, parliament has co nsta ntly if that is true, parliament has constantly removed from him his biggest threat, which is the no deal. In order to maintain a threat, he has had to toe this line of an intentional ambiguity about whether he will break the law, of course he wont. About whether he will prorogue again. Of course he wont. Really . high risk stakes because hes got nothing left. His plan was to go to get another deal with a credible threat and come back with the better deal. Perhaps also he would have gone with the no deal if he had have gone in. But in order to have that threat sound incredible, hes got to allow them believe that he will break the law and end up in prison and that he will go against us supreme court. That he will parade again. Prorogue again. These are the things he is clinging to desperately. He is making people believe him. Maria is not confident. Do you actually believe what he says . Some of it. He is a politician. I take most of it with a pinch of salt. Of course. But this policy of brinkmanship is extremely dangerous and i think it is totally counterproductive. But the eu is doing it too. Even if we have what they call a wto exit, which means no deal, we still have to negotiate a relationship with our trading deals with our partners. Jeffrey, i think this is probably the right week to ask you this is there anything you want to tell us about your teenage years in canada . Did you ever apply dark make up . Justin trudeau. I think the thing about this is that it is a long time ago and it is an absolutely inexcusable act of stupidity and insensitivity. But canada is in the middle of an election. October 21. He has a chance to hold onto at least a minority. The conservatives are very weak and the leader is not getting traction, but the third party has collapsed its vote and so he was poised to at least possibly hold on. This has come at a very odd time, and me thinks maybe someone is gaming the system. It is not that long ago. He was 29. It wasnt so long ago was it acceptable 20 years ago . Dont ask me to defend him. The problem is i think many people say that incredulity is fake. And it is for political reasons. Perhaps it is. Three times like a hobby. I think if he werent king of being woke, perhaps it would not been such a big deal. Explain woke . If you look it up in the dictionary, you will find a picture ofjustin trudeau, but im not sure what colour the picture would be. The question is, will this affect. Apart from the fact he is an idiot for having done it, will this affect the outcome of the election on october 21 . The sense that i am getting from canada is that, no, this is not going to undermine him. His record as Prime Minister oddly goes right against those photos which is why it is so hard to reconcile. Putting pressure on the then attorney general over not taking action. But, again, that is a more nuanced issue, the alleged corruption in that case because he was, on one level, trying to protect one of canadas largest employers from collapsing. This is a man whose reputation in canada is for compassion and tolerance, which is why these photos are just so disconnecting. I cant get exercised about this brownface thing because all my white friends go to tanning salons and want to look like me, so i take it as a compliment. A lot of my asian friends who are canadians, indian pakistani etc, are all behind him. They love the man. They absolutely love the man. I would not say that even supporters universally love him. There is a bit of a feeling of, oh, come on, justin. But i think the canadian papers today are saying that people are not going to buy this be a reason to throw him out of office. That does not mean he is going to win. It could add to others is the issue. It could add to others is the issue. It is not enough to keep him out of office. It wont on its own be enough. This is catastrophic and indefensible, but the timing is obviously designed to undermine him. The question is he has got a month to recover, he is already moving on to talk about other issues. And the question is will the voters move on . We only have a week to recover, but we will be back next week with more dateline london. From all of us, thank you. Goodbye. Hello. A transition to a more settled weather tight through the weekend. Sunshine on saturday, showers on sunday but temperatures are still in the high 20s. This was the scene in cornwall as the sun went down on sunday night, and as we start monday morning, a fairly u nsettled start monday morning, a fairly unsettled picture to come through this week, a lot of fairly wet and windy weather and it will be quite a bit cooler than it has been. The autumn equinox, and although we start the day on a dry note for many areas, we have an approaching area of low pressure which brings increasingly wet and windy weather into the south west. Start the day, northern scotland, a little bit cloudy and damp. The rain works into the south west of england then into wales and northern ireland. The wind picking up. Central and eastern parts of england up toward southern and Central Scotland largely dry and it will be a pleasant day with temperatures up to 21 degrees, certainly fresher than it has been an cooler under the cloud and rain in the west. Monday night, over night into tuesday we will see the rain becoming quite heavy and persistent, especially across parts of southern england, wales could be some standing water lying around tuesday morning. A mild night to come but quite a wet and windy one and that means a good of disruption during tuesday. We had that weather front, this ripple on the front bringing that heavy rain gradually eased through the day and it is particularly across parts of southern england and south wales that all that rain and the gales as well may well lead to a little bit of travel disruption. Through the day we have a band of fairly heavy persistent rain working its way slowly eastwards across england and wales and that will be followed by sunny spells and scattered heavy showers and thunderstorms working in from the south west. Northern ireland in north west scotland should stay mostly dry through the day, temperatures much cooler than they have been, around 15 to 19 celsius. That look at the wind gusts, 30 miles an hour inland, along the south coast, a0 to a5 miles an hour gust, a little bit of disruption. Some of the heavy rain still lingers around across the southeast first thing wednesday, it should clear away and a day of sunny spells are scattered showers, not as windy on wednesday competitor tuesday. Cooler than it has been, about 16 to 20 degrees. It remains autumnal through the week ahead. Bye for now. This is bbc news welcome if youre watching here in the uk or around the globe. Im reged ahmad. Our top stories one of the worlds oldest travel firms, thomas cook, has ceased trading. Britain launches its largest ever peacetime repatriation operation to bring home more than 150,000 stranded customers. As World Leaders gather for another climate summit, we ask can china kick its coal habit . Getting electricity from these things is now cheaper per unit than generating it from coal. And a surprise at the emmys as Phoebe Waller bridge beats off