Palestinian embassy briefing on Gaza

The Scotsman's Westminster Correspondent Alexander Brown reports from a briefing on the situation in Gaza.

Transcript

00:00Hello, my name is Alexander Brown, I'm the Scotsman's Westminster Correspondent and I'm

00:04here at the Arab Chambers of Commerce in Mayfair in London where I just heard a

00:08briefing from the Palestinian ambassador. To say it was harrowing would be an

00:13understatement. The Gaza crisis has been going on for more than a year now and in

00:18this update we heard how 2% of the Gaza population have been killed. I think we

00:23heard about 2.1 million, I think 90% of them have been displaced. We heard

00:29about how 50,000 children are in urgent need of treatment for

00:33malnutrition and there was also testimony from two women who have family

00:37members in Gaza. We heard from one who lost 28 members of her family, 28 members

00:43of her family. She lost grandsons, her parents, sons, daughters, her sister, her

00:49sister's daughters, her sister's grandchildren and she'd stood up here on

00:54a podium just over here where I stand and talked about it with such grace and

00:59such but also understandably anger and to get through that and explain this is

01:03happening and her story as harrowing as it is and incomprehensible as it is, it's

01:07just one story of thousands of stories that's happened to people who are in

01:12Palestine as this crisis continues. There was praise from the Ambassador for

01:17Labour to an extent saying you know things need to get better but it has

01:21improved since the new administration came in, how it's a partial arms sale but

01:25it's a step towards things getting better but the overriding sense here was

01:30just one of desperation. There is no real sign of progress, there is no sign of the

01:35Israeli government having an endgame to this and I think also what's most

01:39striking is I was here, a few other journalists were here but in total the

01:44room is about maybe about 13 people were here and that's including family members

01:49of those who are speaking or you know staffers to the Ambassador.

01:53Essentially as this crisis goes on and it is a crisis and as this these deaths

01:58these thousands of thousands of people die en masse goes on we kind of stop

02:03talking about it we know it's happening but it's not on a human level it's just

02:06an awful thing that's happening as we all continue with our lives so being

02:10here was a stark reminder of that crisis even if so much of the media has

02:15forgotten it it's just a really terrible thing and a really I think important

02:21thing for the Scotsman to be at to kind of bear witness to these testimonies and

02:24just the courage of these women to share their stories. You'll be able to read

02:29about this shortly on Scotsman and for all that and everything that's happening

02:32in the Middle East stay tuned to the Scotsman.com