Secs. of State, Defense Blinken Austin pay a courtesy call to PBBM
Secs. of State, Defense Blinken Austin pay a courtesy call to PBBM
Americans, foreigners in Lebanon urged to split as Israel is set to strike Hezbollah, Houthis
Rebuilding efforts afoot in Kibbutz Beeri, where Hamas fighters struck hard on Oct. 7, 2023
Americans, foreigners in Lebanon urged to split as Israel is set to strike Hezbollah, Houthis
Rebuilding efforts afoot in Kibbutz Beeri, where Hamas fighters struck hard on Oct. 7, 2023
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NewsTranscript
00:00Familiar faces and friends of the nation's closest ally are back in the country for some
00:07high-level engagement with their local counterparts.
00:10Good afternoon.
00:11I am William Theo, and this is PTV News Now.
00:14And we kick off this afternoon's stories with the President welcoming U.S. Secretary of
00:19State Antony Blinken and Defense Chief Lloyd Austin, who flew in and paid a courtesy call
00:25on him at the palace earlier today, bringing with them a message from POTUS Joe Biden,
00:30who extends his heartfelt sympathies to the President and the Filipino people on the damage
00:35and devastation visited by Typhoon Karina deadly passage last week.
00:42Blinken and Austin are still set to join their Philippine counterparts, DFA Secretary Enrique
00:47Manalo and Philippine Defense Secretary Gilberto Todoro, for the fourth Philippine-United States
00:53Foreign and Defense Ministerial Dialogue hosted by Secretary Enrique Manalo and the
01:00Department of Foreign Affairs, and Secretary Gilberto Todoro Jr. and the Department of
01:05National Defense.
01:07Secretaries Blinken, Austin, and their Philippine counterparts Manalo and Todoro are up for
01:12high-level talks on how to consolidate even more the already strong and robust friendship
01:17and alliance between the two.
01:19Furthermore, the talks are hoped to create and enable a program that backs up a rule-based
01:25international order, stimulates and ramps up economic ties, as well as solutions to
01:30evolving regional and global security challenges, such as the very dicey and cumbersome issue
01:36of freedom of navigation and movement within the country's exclusive economic zone in
01:42the West Philippine Sea.
01:46With Gaza still in the midst of a raging war, yet another flashpoint northward is threatening
01:51to erupt into full-scale hostilities between Israel and the militant and far more capable
01:57Iranian-backed Hezbollah fighters.
02:00This after a deadly attack on Israeli-occupied Golan Heights over the weekend, where a rocket
02:06fire hit a soccer field with Jewish kids playing at the time of the blast.
02:11A dozen Jewish kids lost their lives the result of the airstrike.
02:16Israeli government officials accused Iran of helping plan and finance the attack, which
02:21US officials, to include Blinken and Austin, were quick to condemn amidst the pushback.
02:27The governments of the United Kingdom, Germany and France have sent advisories and warnings
02:32to their constituents in Lebanon to leave and not take any chances.
02:38In other news, barbaric Hamas fighters laid waste and unspeakable horror on over 1,200
02:44unsuspecting Israelis on October 7, as such as Netanyahu's government and the IDF have
02:51yet to let up in their retaliatory attacks against Hamas and innocent Palestinians, whose
02:56death toll has reached over 39,000 casualties.
03:01And then again, VOA's Linda Gradstein filed her support in the kibbutz hit hardest by
03:05Hamas, where a rainbow of hope hangs over as rebuilding efforts have finally kicked
03:11off.
03:12Surveying the destroyed ruins of his kibbutz Be'eri home, Sharon Shabo says he doesn't
03:17want to always look back to the October 7 attack by Hamas gunmen.
03:22The attack on Be'eri was considered the worst of all the Israeli community's border in Gaza,
03:27resulting in the murder of 101 and the kidnapping of 30 civilian members of the kibbutz.
03:34There is nothing to take from here.
03:37It is all part of the past, part of the tragedy.
03:40I want to look forward to good things.
03:44These damaged neighborhoods will be destroyed, and we will rebuild in a new area, which will
03:49help the soul to heal, not to build where our loved ones were murdered.
03:58The desire to leave behind the more than 100 destroyed homes and rebuild them motivates
04:03Shabo, a construction engineer who is working on the kibbutz rehabilitation project.
04:08A vacant plot of land has already been cleared for the first stage of constructing 52 new
04:13houses over the next year and a half.
04:15The full rehabilitation of the kibbutz, with 120 new homes, is expected to take about three
04:21years and cost $100 million.
04:24Immediately after the October 7th Hamas attack, most kibbutz residents were evacuated to hotels
04:30at the Dead Sea.
04:31They have stayed there for almost 10 months, but plan to move together to another southern
04:36Israeli community in the next month.
04:39About 40 residents have already moved back from the Dead Sea to their still intact homes
04:43in kibbutz Be'eri, although not all of them on a full-time basis.
04:49Our hope is to come back.
04:50We love the place.
04:52We came here for Zionist reasons.
04:54And my children are Zionists.
04:56They love Be'eri and want to be here through fire and water.
05:00The Be'eri Dairy, which has produced artisanal cheeses for over 30 years, was one of Be'eri's
05:06businesses that reopened just weeks after October 7th.
05:10Its manager, Dror Or, was killed in the Hamas attack, and his body is still being held hostage
05:15in Gaza.
05:16But his partners and co-workers decided to keep the dairy operating.
05:20The business brings kibbutz residents back to work daily, as does Be'eri Printers, the
05:25largest printing press in Israel.
05:27Be'eri is on the map and it will stay on the map.
05:31And we have a lot of plans for the future.
05:35And this is our home.
05:37You don't abandon your home.
05:41An internal investigation by the Israeli army found the army made many catastrophic mistakes
05:46in their response to the Hamas invasion of kibbutz Be'eri.
05:51Most kibbutz residents say they want to rebuild and move back home, but they are calling on
05:55Israel's military forces to ensure there is never again a repeat of what happened here
06:00on October 7th.
06:01Linda Gradstein, VOA News, kibbutz Be'eri, Israel.
06:09And that's a wrap for this afternoon.
06:11Join us a little bit later in the evening for another set of stories for PTV News Now.
06:16As always, stay informed and get ahead by catching the news right here.
06:20This is William Thio, and thank you for watching PTV News Now.