Full cost, singleton some of them. It will enable meet urologist to triple the number of locations across the country where they can predict flooding rain storms last year, with the worst in a decade, killing, endangering dozens of people, and displacing thousands. A lucy ever we hope to significantly reduce the amount of time it takes to predicts nothing. But that still doesnt reduce the increasing impact of extreme weather events. South korea is also turning to ever more im vicious infrastructure like this underground tunnel capable of capturing and holding a 3rd of a 1000000 tons of rain water. Enough to fill a 160 swimming pools running for near the full kilometers on the cell. It will still go to us that would otherwise flood the city above to be late to pump to way through this with climate change, an abnormal weather pattons happening globally. I believe this Tunnel Technology could become an important export item. South korea was preparing defences for itself. But also developing nc flooding measures that could be used in other parts of a world facing the same climate process. Rob mcbride, ill just say era, so are about set to fold a bunch. Of course you can follow what the covering here on out is there a by logging on to our website is out as the top cover is updated throughout the day, we continue to focus on the situation rougher and the movement of palestinians to safe areas. And the ongoing bombardment as well. Weve got good news at the top of the 3 navigator will tops the news off and next off is that its the bottom line. Once we time to complete the a, we do look at the worlds top business storage. How much of the rebuilding going to cost and who pays from Global Markets and economies of Small Businesses we have just started seeing and station come down and how it affects the lives. How big a problem is global food insecurity. Counting the cost . Oh, no jersey or the suitcase of the best documentary pounds from across the name on the 0. A. Hi ark. Steve clemens and i have a question. Does the us shield israel from the laws that are meant to deny weapons for human rights violators . Lets get to the bottom line. The United States as the worlds biggest supplier of weapons, decades ago, laws were put into place to prevent the supply of those weapons, the countries that commit, quote, gross violations of human rights. Perhaps the most famous of those laws is the late he law of 1997, named after its lead sponsored, former senator Patrick Leahy and just this past february, after months of israels war and gaza, the by the administration published the National Security memorandum thats known as n s m 20, and it requires the state department to report to congress or whether it finds it is real, is credible when it makes assurances that its uses of us weapons do not violate us law or international law. So what are the requirements of those us laws when it farms other countries and are these mechanisms applied equally across the world, especially when it comes to israel. Today were speaking with stephanie curse gessner, deputy head of investigations for the guardian, u. S. And steven record, a distinguished fellow in the Human Rights Institute at Georgetown University law center. Let me read something to you. This is v lahey law. Lahey law says no assistance shall be furnished to any unit of the Security Forces of a foreign country. If the secretary of state has credible information that such unit has committed a gross violation of human rights. So if you just did a deep dive into the late he law on its and its practice and the use of it as applied to israel. What did you find as well generally, my findings were that, um, the way he law, as many experts have said to me is not being really followed or executed in terms of israel. And that somehow, even though it applies to many countries, including you know, us allies are especially, was allies that if not for some reason, even though though there are significant reports of gross and allegations of gross violation to human rights. And that somehow its not affecting israel, and my reporting really took me um, you know, i spoke to a lot of former officials and i saw state department documents and i really concluded that there are special policies in place like, mechanism mechanisms. Yes. These are sort of deep in the procedures of the state department that basically give israel an out and thats these do not exist for any other countries or allies. Can you share with this a few of these mechanisms that you found . Yeah, sure. So there are basically 3 that i found 1st, because the way the process works is all the different. Um, you know, groups within the state department or departments that are looking at a, an incident, have to agree that a gross violation fluoride has occurred. That is not applied to anyone else. So in other instances, there can be a staff finding that this has happened. There doesnt need to be this broad consensus. And that broadcast is i read your article was you know, different bureaus and agencies in the state department. Even our embassy, all have to come into agreement and alignment that and abuses occurred. Yes. So why does this exist only for israel or the 2nd case is that israel is notified when such a review is occurring and of that ins. Oh, and that you know of the specific allegation and they have 90 days to respond. So is one form or official put it this is just delaying the process. No other country gets this kind of notification not to be fair. In my discussion with the state department, they said look, we discussed with a lot of in countries like there are discussions that go on. Its not that it never happens however, but theres a formalized process with israel, the 90 day return. Yes. Yeah. Okay. And then the 3rd mechanism, and then the 3rd mechanism, which is, you know, in plain sight, is that, um, the way he law has been updated over the years in congress. You know, commerce has updated it. And in 2021. There were a bunch of countries that signed new kind of agreements within the way he law agreements. So i looked at, you know, more than a dozen of them. And only in the case of israel is their language that says which both you know, whos really official and as really a master in fact. And the us official senior us official signed off saying israel has a robust independent legal system, including its military Justice System. So why is that important . Its important because it allows israel to say, look, this violation may have happened or some, some might believe that it happened, but we have the capability is a strong democracy with a strong Justice Systems take care of it. And essentially, United States government has said, yes, thats the case. So what im hearing from you to put in late personal language is the, is, is really military courts are their own judge and jury . Well, i think that the Us Government saying we believe that its independence, that its, that is that essentially they can review their own potential misstates, steve, i think our audience know thing. Most people will know. America is the biggest arm sell sales entity in the world. I did not realize that there were as many filters and constraints on us weapons sales as there were. It was interesting to read that. In fact, we do have a system and that lahey law has mattered in many, many, many cases. Can you give us a sense of the application of the law, the scale of it, and has it applied to israel in the same way as it is applied to many other nations . Sure, well 1st we need to distinguish a little bit between arm sales and military assistance. Right. Were really talking about here is tax payer us taxpayer funded dollars being given to other countries, not their purchasing weapons here. And what senator leahy said toward the end of the 9 days when other human rights laws just didnt seem to be coming in to force, they just werent being put in place or actually implemented was he said, well, if we have to be in these countries and if you think and gauge meant in these countries is so important and you tell us theres just a few bad apples in the barrel, then lets agree to a minimum floor. And that minimum floor has 4 parts. If we have credible information that a specific unit of a battalion a uh, a Company Division is committing the worst human rights abuses and nothing has been done about it. Lets at least not our give tax payer funded military 8 or training to those specific units. And thats what the way he law requires it. People need to understand the scope of American Military assistance. We give tens of billions of dollars a way to other countries. Its fundamental to our nash, well Security Strategy at the moment. Devil light footprint by building up the forces in country and partnering with them. And so the lee law just says, okay, if youre going to do that and we have the information that there are bad units doing the worst possible things. Lets quarantine those units and not work with those units. Now, this law has been applied in scores of countries. Thousands of times literally thousands of times, but so far as were aware, and in no case, has the state department ever been willing to apply. It is real, even in cases where the Human Rights Community was pretty clear that there was credible information that a gross human rights violation had occurred. Steve, i had sent over to Chris Van Holland on the show recently, and he said, were seeing textbook war crimes every day on the television. Or were, were able to see this in real time and real visuals and, and this is happening. Weve seen senator Bernie Sanders and others, basically come out and talk about the dangers of being a complicit in whats going on. And so, but as i read stephanies piece on the history of the application of the late he law with regards to israel, it seems like that law was set up to try to prevent. In fact, that complicity with senator sanders incentive in holland have been worried about. So what has gone off the rails here from your perspective . Well, i think stephanies superb article really does lay out a lot of the problems now. And i should say, this isnt completely unique to, to israel. There is a bias in the department of defense and in the state department toward engagement. There is a bias against having fights with other countries. And so for instance, it took a decade before the state department would apply. The recently adopted law on child soldiers. And i mean, everybody got a waiver for a whole decade just because they dont want to fight with other countries. They dont want to have, you know, theyve got lots of interest, etc. So its been hard to apply this law in many cases. But in on, you know, in other cases, despite those difficulties in pakistan, in nigeria, in columbia, the state department eventually has been able to apply it. Now sometimes what theyll do is theyll say, and this is relevant to the point about consensus. Theyll say, all right, if you dont agree, you dont think the information you the defense department, dont think the and the information is credible. You. The embassy are arguing that the case the, the criminal proceedings that took place were adequate to deal with the problem. We dont agree with the human rights bureau. Dont agree with the political mirror, Political Military Affairs bureau at the state of and dont agree. Lets just suspend to the unit. We wont agree that its in the eligible for all future purposes, but lets not go forward with the training exercise. So lets not go forward with the 8 that happens about 10 times for every one time. They actually say this is the unit thats on the ineligible list. It is quarantined. And so, if you put in place for israel as stephanies article documents, a requirement that every one agree you are just from the start, youre taking out of the way he law, about 9 out of every 10 cases where the law had, in other cases, been effective we just had steve 4 cases as i understand it may have the numbers wrong, but 4 units that were identified recently and is we all have having committed gross violations, Human Rights Violations and abuses and secretary of state anthony blinking, determined in those cases that the actions taken by the israelis were enough to uh, basically forestall any action that we did in sort of the certifying their re, this seemed to be very, very controversial in human rights groups. Can you tell us more . Yeah, i, stephanie mentioned that uh, yeah, this, this provision in the agreement with israel, the says upfront, we think that israels judiciary is independent and robust. All right. Heres the, heres the same agreement for greece. Doesnt say anything like that. So far as i know, greece as a robust and independent judicial system, but they didnt think it was necessary to say that in the agreement with the government of greece. And since the fact is that theyve been very serious concerns about the independence of the is really military judicial system. And to be clear, its fair to make distinctions between countries and be israel does have a relatively independent judiciary and press as a compared to many other countries where the United States is working. But that doesnt mean its perfect anymore than our courts are perfect or our system of military justice always gets it right. And there been very serious concerns that have been raised not only outside of israel by human rights groups, but by credible voices within israel, including a bus. A panel of senior retired is really judges who looked at the military Justice System some years ago and had a series of critiques that the prosecutors, for instance, werent sufficiently independent of the chain of command. So they could be influence. So its not to say that that is real, doesnt have compared to, you know, many other countries that were, were in, right, a better judicial system. But that doesnt mean that it gets it right. Or that adequate punishments have been handed down so that you can find under the late he law. That effective steps have been taken. Stephanie, one of the pieces in your article where we kind of refer to a weekly, but you actually put a word in term to it as an institutionalization of this process. And you were the 1st to report about it designed or stand is the is real lahey vetting form, which is part of the organized structure of decision making. I love to hear more about that, but also with regards to cases that do rise and you go through a litany of cases of individuals that were essentially murdered and extra good. Few additional killings of found by that, but by both sides of cetera with no penalties, et cetera. We had the killing of a colleague of our serene abu aqua who was also one of these cases that rose to the very top of the is really Justice System and, and, and review. And also the us system is no militants in the area shopped in the head, etc. And another of these cases id love to hear about some of these cases that you investigated. But also the is really lahey of getting for them. Well, yeah, to, to, to your point, i mean, its disturbing to say the least that among the cases that i mentioned in my reporting to involve american citizens, your colleague sharing a bu, a clay and also omar aside. He was a 78 year old who died in Police Custody and he had lived down in United States for many, many years. So there, i think it really raises the question of where, um, you know, why the Us Government, why the state department is not taking greater actions at least on behalf of its own, you know, citizens. And under these circumstances, he is really, is really he reading for um, was essentially created because there are certain countries and israels, one of them where there was so much so much military assistance given that is actually difficult to track the, you know, the, the state department so they did it as a tracking mechanism, not as a mechanism of overall concerned that this could be a constant problem. Yet my understanding is that it was done because there needs to be some, some effort to, to track these countries. The other countries are egypt and ukraine, where there is a because the scale of the foreign assistance is so great. Um and you know what i found my reporting and i think this is whats kind of the point that a lot of people are making now is these are all going to be instances that had been reviewed in the past are way before in october 7th, what how, how has the Us Governments approach to these things . How is the fact that all these exceptions have been made for israel . How is that affected the current conduct of the war . And i think thats where i think thats where the 2 things kind of meet for your article leads to the notion that at least to impunity. I think that some of the people you interviewed, i think was judge paul. Other folks that have resigned from state department rules, theyre concerned, these are people not secretary assistance. Actually theyre there. Theyre doing the nuts and bolts of policy making and policy review and policy implementation, some of whom, including judge paul who resigned because they believe at least to infinity, where they believe it leads to impunity. And that basically, yeah, if youre kind of looking the other way even when it comes to the murder or suspicious death of your own citizens and what is really the then then doesnt that send a message both on the political level of the government level, but also the individual units that arent really being held accountable at all. I think its all really coming to a head now. There is this interesting moment right now were President Biden has put on pause the delivery of some weapons. Now the reportedly here is put the pos on those, those weapons because of concerns about how they may be used in rasa. Now as far as im concerned, i dont know if thats because of National Security memorandum 20, which chris fan holland had been pushing or because of the lacy law or joe biden, just operating with you know, a got feel. Is there a problem in this it, when you kind of look at a relationship like this, where were not using law, but were using god or him . I mean, im just interested in the suspension and whether its an Inflection Point for a different approach, or whether its a speed bump with the same behaviors. Continue your thoughts the as well. You know, when i, when we sell weapons to a country, so were not, its not tax pay or underwritten not, not military a, but we sell weapons to a country. We actually makes that country pay a little bit more than the cost of the weapon to administer the sale and to administer investigations of whether or not the weapons are being used in a way thats consistent with us law. Theyre not transferred to other countries that we wouldnt have sold them to in the 1st place. But somehow, when were actually giving the, the aid it a, you know, the, the idea that we should, we, the american taxpayer should have the ability to say, well, we support is really always real. As a, as an ally, they were attacked. Theyve a right to defend themselves, but we would like to know how the aids being used and if the 8 is being used to commit gross Human Rights Violations, right . We dont want our techs peer dollars used for that. Um, its a, its a minimum floor that, that, you know ought to be applied. Right. But apparently, i mean, i think the big question, steve and, and stephanie, i think that the door that stephanie opened, at least in my mind, reading this incredibly interesting history of the failure to apply this, this law. And the case of israel, as we applied elsewhere, is whats the state of the american brand when it comes to human rights . As we talk about Human Rights Violations all around the world, what is the state of america standing, being able to comment on that . If in fact you have such huge glaring loopholes in the application, even with one of your closest allies. Yeah, i mean, i think of the case of sharing a block away and that this is the appropriate place to talk about it as a, as a journalist myself, you know, its just so outrages that theres not been any accountability whatsoever. And what, you know, again, pointing to really an extreme example of, of that killing, of that it really does do significant damage to uh, administration, or president who, who swore that this is going to be a real, a central part of his foreign policy. You know, where, where are we seeing that its and i, i think that there could be a lot, you know, if there was any, at any motion to, to address those issues and go very far away even even a long way, even in individual cases. And by the way, you know, congress has been calling for it. You know, there are many members of congress whove been very vocal on that case. And yet, uh, we still dont have that more information about it. Steve. You know, the United States on human rights has both the failure and the virtue of being inconsistent on this issue. That is to say that it, it, it, it least in some cases does this. Its certainly talks a good game and, and theres, its, its important to reinforce the value of human rights. I mean, we have data for fiscal year 2020. I think thats the last year that i have this data for. And there were 129 units that were found in eligible into the late he law. In that one year, a 129. 00 units. There were 994 units that were suspended from getting a better. So we didnt, we didnt necessarily find them ineligible and put them on the pariah list. But we just said theres enough here that we shouldnt go forward. So thats 1123. 00 cases in one fiscal year, where the lady last stop tax period from going forward. The units that were credibly alleged to be involved in gross Human Rights Violations. Thats not nothing. You can go on the us on, on the state Department Website right now, and look at the list of countries over the last 5 years. You know, bangladesh believes breaking a fast. So burundi, cambodia, georgia, you know, the list goes on where the law has been applied, but then you come to israel and clearly theres something going on there. There are cases with credible organizations, clear documentation, gross violations never been found to fall under the way he law. And i think you get in terms of the question of a sense of impunity. You just look at the reaction from the government of israel to the mere suggestion that one unit might be put on the pariah list. And its absolutely clear that, that this was utterly unexpected. And theyre pushing back very, very hard. If theres one positive thing thats coming out of this, its that i used to call the late law the most important law. Nobodys ever heard of. Well, now people understand that that, that law exists and its there to protect their tax payer dollars from being used to underwrite human rights abuses. And they want it in force. Well, one of the quotes in stephanies article, which came directly from senator leahy and well conclude here, is that the law has not been applied consistently. And what we have seen in the west bank and gaza is a stark example of that. Over many years i erred successive us administrations to apply the law there, but it does not happen and stuff, you know, give you the last word. I mean, this is an amazing quote from the senator who drafted in and, and took this legislation into law. Your quick final thoughts um, well theres a sad uh, paper trail i would say paper trail, it starts at least one that i saw starting with uh, george, really bush, um colin powell going all the way up to um, well, well, leaving up through successive ministration. So until today and which senator leahy is sending letters on a regular basis saying what about this case and what he lot, what about that case and that way he will all is really cases and theres just essentially silence on the other end. Its chillers and palm peo, colin powell, all of it basically is Hillary Clinton about Hillary Clinton, carrots, and well have to stop there. John kerry, stephanie curse, guest or investigative journalist with the guardian. U. S. And steven record at Georgetown University law center. Thank you so much for being with us today. Really appreciate it. So whats the bottom line . The United States is always thought of itself as a nation of laws. The law supposed to matter and no one is above the law, even president s. But when it comes to american actions outside its borders, between is just much less legal and a lot more money. Lets face it even when Congress Works on legislation, method demand accountability and support, human rights enforcement, subject to domestic politics. A good example is the lacy law, which costs for reviews of americans, weapons shipments and reports about their use and abuse. And israels war and gaza. Weve watch textbook cases of war crimes, to quote sen Chris Van Holland. And yet we cant get the same finding a fax from Us State Department and the binding the ministration this leads to impunity. And that makes the world a much less safe place. And thats the bottom line, the odd agent interviews for the oil see suffered casualties. We have not suffered fatalities. Thank goodness we did have injuries from a missile strike on a guest house, thought provoking on to who that you say know double standards to all of us. Any anyone in particular . I said, all facing realities government seems here to whittle down democracy. Its because its troubling for you. Its very, very painful here. The story on talk to how does era unique perspective, why is it the doctors dont get to have a say in any of the medical workforce has been so and devalued by the British Government for such a long time on hub voices. Tick tock had been a place for organizing politically, for getting people to vote for getting people to protest, connect with our community and tap into conversations you werent find elsewhere. Why is our government taking us to work on the basis of live . We . The public has to get out there and do something about it. The stream on al jazeera, this business uptake this voltage by the city bank Growth Partner of on the dash before he is the these business uptake. These me roy thought no bundle dash football to use injustice for me is the driving force of why i do this to show people what its like to live in places where injustice isnt something you read in the news is something that happens to every single day whether its a war, a natural disaster, whether its political corruption, making sure that they understand in a simple language is absolutely crucial. The cities already 50 percent evacuated, most of those people actually left in the early days of the world. I couldnt do this job without the best cumberland, best produced is the best fixes and those other people the i rely on in order to be able to get that message out to the well the on the youre watching the news, our life from headquarters in south time teddy, you navigate, heres whats coming up in the next 60 minutes. Israel says 5 soldiers have been killed in northern garza by friendly fire, but how much says its responsible . Thats as more than 600000 palestinians have been forced to flee the south in just 10 days. South africa requests that you and top court orders, israel to hold its offensive injured off off. Were live at the have plus russels lot americans that expresses his gratitude to exchange and paying for chinas initiatives to resume