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The Rector of an elite Scottish university is bringing a discrimination claim against the 600 year old institution, amid claims she was unfairly removed for condemning genocide in Gaza in an email to students.

Shortly after her election as Rector of St Andrews, and amid Israel's bombing of Gaza, Maris sent a message to all St Andrews students, calling for a ceasefire in November 2023.

After a disclaimer noting she spoke only as an elected representative, not for the university as a whole, she went on to denounce both the Israeli government's 'genocidal attacks' on Gaza and Hamas' targeting of civilians and taking of hostages. She spoke of 'apartheid' in Palestine and of war crimes.

Following a paragraph condemning Hamas' terrorist attacks on October 7th she added: "It's essential to acknowledge the reasons behind these actions, understanding that they are rooted in decades of oppression and systematic mistreatment. This historical context is crucial."

The message triggered a raft of supportive and opposing petitions and activism on campus, with the Amnesty International society backing her and the Jewish students' society condemning her.

The university's senior leadership team said some students were "deeply offended and concerned" by her email, and that some Jewish students felt unsafe.

In a statement, the management figures added: "The language it used, and some of the sources it cited [e.g. Electronic Intifada] have caused alarm, division and harm in our community, and more widely…As individuals and as a group of senior leaders, asked her to reflect seriously on the evidence of the upset and fear she has caused."

Maris stood by her message and hit back at all suggestions of anti-Semitism.

Fired and Rehired

The KC, Morag Ross, found in her July report that Maris had shown "poor judgement" and reputational damage to the university, but that dismissal would be a "disproportionate response".

"The Statement was a single issue. It contained a disclaimer. Division in the University was not entirely due to the Statement. Dismissal would interfere with Ms Maris' rights to freedom of expression in an unjustified way," Ross KC said.

But on 1 August 2024, the University Court announced it would dismiss Maris and remove her as a trustee of the university. The governing body alleged that she had refused to accept the findings of the independent investigation (something Maris denies), engage constructively with management in response to the backlash, or take part in mediation.

The university's principal, Sally Mapstone, also claimed that her message had jeopardised a £2m donation from the Wolfson Foundation. However, the Foundation later denied that the donation was ever at risk.

Maris appealed her dismissal, and was successful in April 2025. The following month, she was reinstated as St Andrews University Rector.

The university denies that she was sacked for speaking out on Gaza, and instead argues her removal related to her conduct after her statement to 10,000 members of the institution.

But the St Andrews Rector is seeking a formal apology and damages from the university, alleging that she faced a breach of her right to free expression under the European Convention on Human Rights and the Human Rights Act 1998.

She is also alleging she faced direct discrimination on the basis of a protected belief, contrary to section 13 of the Equality Act 2010, and indirect discrimination on the basis of disability under the same act.

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'Stifling Free Speech'

Maris, who is 26, told Byline Times: "When I became Rector, I made it pretty clear that I wanted to release a statement about Gaza. There was significant pushback, and I did try to engage senior leadership to get their feedback on what I was going to say.

"I consulted with the Jewish Society a...

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Where does hope come from? The relentless diet of terrible news sits heavily on our shoulders and drags us all down at least a few notches.

Charlatans like Nigel Farage and President Donald Trump seem to get away with murder. And the disappointment of Labour in Government - and its maddening decisions to do things like cut the regulations that stop the city exploding the economy again, boil our blood. The constant dread of climate chaos, the awful relentlessness of unnecessary poverty, and of course the daily horrors of Gaza mean that shadows darken our path.

None more so than the decision to designate Palestine Action as a terrorist organisation. Because it is so revealing. Progressive Governments, if they are to deliver meaningful change, need not just visions and ideas but countervailing forces to take on those of the right.

For a Labour Government - I repeat in Kinnock-esque Welsh tones, 'a Labour Government' - to actively and purposefully undermine the ability of citizens to protest against the inhumanity of what is happening in Gaza shows a Government that's become deeply enmeshed in the British establishment.

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Because this isn't just about Palestine Action, this is about asserting the coercive power of the state over any and all challenge to what is in the interests of that establishment. And worse than that the principle has been established, that on the most spurious grounds the interests of the state can crush the deeply held beliefs of the citizen and in the future Robert Jenrick, Farage or worse can apply that principle to anyone on the left who gets in their sights.

This then becomes a double whammy. By refusing to offer the country the change they promised at the last election, Labour paves the way for Reform, not because people believe Farage will be any better, but in the absence of hope you might as well roll the dice.

But they make matters worse by preparing the ground for an authoritarian state response to anyone who challenges the economic and global orthodoxies of the establishment they have submitted to. This of course is a vicious spiral, the more a Government resists the economic democratic changes needed, the more people will protest beyond the ballot box.

And it's not just citizens that Labour looks to discipline, but its own backbenchers. Suspensions handed out to MPs merely trying to defend their constituents stands in stark contrast to rebellions under the last Labour Government who knew that keeping left wing rebels like Jeremy Corbyn inside the tent was crucial in electoral terms.

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Adrian Goldberg

But by suspending people like Corbyn, the brittleness of this approach has been exposed through the inevitable creation of a left-wing alternative with mass appeal in the shape of Your Party.

So yes, the world can feel bleak.

But then we remind ourselves that we can be and are so much better than this. That nothing lasts forever. And that what seems impossible today can become reality tomorrow.

Important evidence for this can be found in research being pulled together by Common Cause which shows the trend, though uneven, that UK citizens increasingly prioritise universalism and benevolence values.

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For the seventh time in its history, the baton of artistic director of the National Theatre changes hands in September, as Indhu Rubasingham opens her first season.

She is not only the first woman to be put in charge of the country's pre-eminent theatre, but also the first person of colour.

It is a measure of how limited the gene pool had become that she is also the first since its founder Laurence Olivier not to have graduated from Cambridge (Rubasingham went instead to Hull, and Olivier the Central School of Speech Training and Dramatic Art).

The National's board was not, however, in the business of making a politically correct statement with Rubasingham's appointment.

All it sought was the best possible candidate and that, I have no hesitation in saying, is what it has got. I speak as a critic who as long ago as 2013 was making the case for Rubasingham in the Sunday Telegraph as "the best and brightest young theatre boss we have in this country" and have long looked upon her taking over the National as a happy inevitability.

When I began reviewing just after the turn of the millennium, it was very obvious that there were two directors who were head and shoulders above the rest: Rubasingham, putting what was then the Tricycle Theatre - later to become the Kiln - in north London on the map; and the somehwat older and more established Michael Grandage, who was at the time presiding over what would come to be seen as a ground-breaking decade in charge of the Donmar in London's Covent Garden.

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The pair have much in common and are, needless to say, friends.

Neither are especially fond of presiding over buildings with all of the admin, bureaucracy, and politics that entails. Their first love is directing and, with typical courage, Rubasingham has chosen to direct Bacchae, the curtain-raiser to her first season.

Of course, it raises, too, the stakes as she will know very well that, if it is not a success, then it will be on her as the new boss. But she also clearly wants to make it clear that she is determined - very much in the tradition of Olivier - to get to play as much as she possibly can in her own toyshop.

She very much deserves to, as nothing has ever been handed to Rubasingham on a plate.

She was born in Sheffield to Tamil parents from Sri Lanka and, after a spell at Nottingham Girls' High School, she attended Hull University to study drama. There was then an Arts Council bursary to work as an assistant director at the Theatre Royal Stratford East, where Mike Leigh was her boss. She subsequently freelanced as a director and I had caught some of her productions - notably Disconnect at the Royal Court, which I loved.

It was only after I got see a play that she put on called Handbagged - about Margaret Thatcher's fractuous relationshp with Queen Elizabeth - that I got to appreciate the consistent flair (I would say genius) in her work.

Rubasingham is in person modest and self-deprecating and, even at her farewell party when she left the Kiln in 2023, I noticed how she was always building other people up, rather than wallowing in the limelight and adulation herself. She seemed embarrassed when anyone alluded to the staggeringly successful run she had had at what had previously always been seen as no more than a small community theatre. On one occasion, under her leadership, that small community theatre simultaneously had a Broadway transfer - with Red Velvet - and a West End one with Handbagged.

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A new 'vigilante' volunteer patrol group in Bournemouth was established by an organiser of anti-asylum hotel protests and is being fronted by a recent Reform UK council candidate.

Safeguard Force, a vigilante-style volunteer group patrolling the streets of Bournemouth, with a view to preventing crime, launched its first patrol on Monday 11 August.

The group claims to have no political affiliation or objective. A post on the group's Facebook page from 30 July stated: "We are the community - doing this for the community. This is not about politics or headlines. It's about real people standing up for real safety."

However, Byline Times can reveal that one of Safeguard Force's founders, Gary Bartlett, a Dorset-based small businessman, helped organise protests against asylum seeker hotels and moderates a Facebook group containing Islamophobic and anti-migrant posts in which he asked for support for Safeguard Force. And a key spokesperson for the group stood for Reform this February.

Bartlett is the admin, alongside a handful of others, of 'Taking Back Our Country', a Facebook group which organises nationalist and anti-migrant protests in Dorset.

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Anti-Migrant Tirades

In the group, Bartlett promoted a protest on 9th August against the Roundhouse and Britannia hotels in Bournemouth, used to house asylum seekers, stating, "join us for a peaceful protest outside the Roundhouse and Britannia hotel as we stand together against illegal migrants being housed in our town."

Another post from Bartlett on 20th July read: "You can't call yourself a protester if you never attend a protest. Typing from the sofa does nothing […] the fight needs bodies, not just keyboard warriors."

Bartlett also promoted a protest against "illegal immigration" in August 2024 and shared a clip from UKIP leader and far-right agitator Nick Tenconi, in which UKIP activists demonstrating in Bournemouth in April demanded mass deportations. Tenconi was recently accused of performing a Nazi salute at a protest.

Other posts in the Taking Back Our Country Group included two from Bartlett of AI generated images of machine guns attached to a pedalo and a coin-operated tourist telescope on the white cliffs of Dover, as well a meme with the caption "last time Muslims invaded Europe Vlad stuck poles up their asses and made a fucking forest. Be like Vlad."

Another post on the page (not by Bartlett) included a photo of Arab children holding guns with the caption "just remember when the time comes… while you were teaching your children to be tolerant of others [sic] beliefs. These people were training theirs in how to kill yours."

Bartlett asked for support for Safeguard Force in Taking Back Our Country ahead of its launch.

Byline Times can also reveal that a key spokesperson for the group stood in a recent council election for Reform UK.

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Keir Starmer's Government is being sued in a 'corporate court' by a Singapore based investor in the now-abandoned Cumbria coal mine.

The Singaporean firm, Woodhouse Investment Pte Ltd, whose parent company is domiciled in the Cayman Islands, is suing the British Government alongside the British firm West Cumbria Mining (WCM) and is being represented by former Attorney General and current Conservative MP, Geoffrey Cox, and the law firm Withers.

WCM withdrew its application for planning permission for the mine in April this year, though is now suing the UK Government using a controversial Investor State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) mechanism dubbed a "corporate court" by campaigners.

The ISDS mechanism in question is contained within the UK's bilateral investment treaty with Singapore which was signed in 1975.

Tom Wills, the Director of the Trade Justice Movement told Byline Times: "A fossil fuel company suing the UK Government over climate policies using an opaque system based on a decades-old agreement sounds like something from dystopian fiction. But it's happening right now, and this case shows us that successful climate action will only be possible if the UK rejects the ISDS system.

"To compensate polluters every time we try to protect the environment is unaffordable and obviously unjust. We need to hear that the UK is taking this threat seriously - refusing to sign up to new ISDS agreements and getting out of existing ones."

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The case is the first time the UK has been sued under ISDS since 2006, when an Indian investor failed to sue the Corporation of London. It is the first case to be filed against the UK Government because of climate policy.

However, according to ISDS Tracker, a database of investor-state dispute cases, fossil fuel companies are the biggest beneficiaries of the ISDS system, winning $80.21bn through ISDS claims since 1998.

ISDS cases are particularly controversial because they allow firms to "treaty shop" in which claimants pursue the lawsuit through third party states in order to achieve an advantageous outcome.

In 2023 the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights related to a safe, clean, healthy and sustainable environment, David Boyd, released a report which found that "Foreign investors have weaponized" the "secretive" ISDS system, which "violate[s]" the "the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment". The report also branded the ISDS system "unjust, undemocratic and dysfunctional".

Campaign groups such as Global Justice Now have repeatedly warned that ISDS clauses written into trade or investment agreements are undemocratic and violate national sovereignty.

Cleodie Rickard, trade campaign manager at Global Justice Now said: "We've been calling on the Government to scrap ISDS in its trade deals for years, to stop exactly this eventuality: fossil fuel companies suing us over necessary climate action".

The proposals for the Whitehaven mine, the first deep coal mine in the UK in 30 years, were quashed last year when the High Court blocked the plans citing concerns around emissions targets.

The judge, Justice Holgate, agreed with Friends of the Earth that Michael Gove had unlawfully accepted West Cumbria Mining's claim that the mine would be net zero and would not affect the country's ability to meet the emissions cuts required under the Climate Change Act 2008.

The Labour Government withdrew support for the mine in the legal case in July last year, with lawyers acting on behalf of the Ministry of Housing Communities and Local Government calling the decision to approve planning permission for the mine an "error in law".

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Jeremy Corbyn's left-wing alternative to Labour doesn't formally exist yet, but there are already signs of a rift between those at the centre of the fledgling party and grass roots supporters demanding a greater say in how it's run.

More than 700,000 people have so far signed up to the mailing list of the new group - provisionally called 'Your Party. As well as Corbyn and Sultana, it boasts the backing of four independent MP's elected on pro-Gaza mandates last July.

The new party's launch was botched, however, when Sultana declared in July that she and Corbyn would be its co-leaders - an announcement seen as an attempt to 'bounce' the former Labour leader into a partnership before his involvement had been officially announced.

Now comes another problem for Your Party; demands by local organisers for greater participation in how its constitution and policies are formed.

Among them is Alan Story, a journalist and activist from Norwich.

Story has claimed via his Substack The Left Lane that details of prospective members who have registered with the party nationally are not being shared at local level.

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He told the Byline Podcast it felt like fighting a war where the artillery was being held in reserve, rather than being taken to the battlefield where it is needed.

He said: "We need the names. We need people. We want to get them mobilised. If someone sent a message two weeks ago saying, 'I want to join this party' but then they don't hear anything for months, where is this party going?"

"We've got things to do on the grassroots level, but if we don't have the tools to do it, then we're quite neutered."

So far, Story and his colleagues have independently generated more than 200 contacts for 'Your Party' in Norwich via social media and personal contacts, but believe hundreds more would be accessible via the national database.

"Word of mouth is fine," he said, "but we want to get the members involved, making videos, doing all the kinds of exciting things that can be done as an alternative to Labour and Reform.

"But we're hampered. We're not allowed to do that. I think it's completely the wrong way to build a party."

Story claims the blockage is due to a 'decree' by Karie Murphy, Executive Director of Corbyn's office when he was Leader of the Opposition between 2016 and 2020.

She now heads Collective, a Corbyn-inspired group which describes itself as "the engine that will drive the formation of a new, mass membership political party of the left in the UK."

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Murphy is clearly irked by what she regards a personal attack by Story, who sourced his information from attendees on a Zoom call among an inner group of prospective organisers.

She told Byline Times: "I explained the data collated from those interested in joining a new political party would not be randomly shared at this time with 'unknown individuals or groupings' in geographical areas or in Scotland and Wales.

"This was not a 'decree' but a sharing of information, and my intent was clear - encouraging those actually organising in their communities to build events and gatherings without relying on this data to build on the momentum.

"I further added work was continuing to plan and make the best use at [a] local level of the data gathered".

And she pointed out that, "Your Party is not, as yet, a political party."

These growing pains reflect a battle...

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The UK Gaza Community - a group representing 350 Palestinian families living in the UK - has urged Keir Starmer to demand an international investigation into what it calls Israel's "unprecedented and systematic assault on the press."

Their appeal follows an Israeli missile strike in Gaza City that killed seven people on Sunday (10th August), including Al Jazeera reporters Anas Al-Sharif and Mohammed Qreiqueh, cameramen Ibrahim Zaher and Mohammed Noufal, and two other media workers, Moamen Aliwa and Mohammad Al-Khalidi.

"These journalists are not just names on a screen - they are well known to us. They are friends, relatives, former classmates, and people from our neighbourhoods. Their families, schools, and communities are deeply woven into our own lives here in the UK," the group wrote in a letter to Keir Starmer, Foreign Secretary David Lammy, and Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy on Tuesday.

"They have been the faces and voices relating the horror back home to us, and their loss is deeply distressing and personal," the letter reads.

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The community has also called for the British Government to take other steps, including the suspension of arms sales and military cooperation with Israel and the use of diplomatic measures to call for the protection of journalists and civilians.

"The killing of journalists - targeted or through reckless disregard - is a breach of international humanitarian law and an assault on truth itself," the group writes, accusing Israel of attempting to "disguise a genocidal project from public view."

The Israeli military has claimed, with no tangible evidence, that Al-Sharif had "served as the head of a terrorist cell in Hamas." Al Jazeera denies the claims, as did Al-Sharif before his death in a public post on 'X'. The IDF has so far remained silent about the six others killed in the attack.

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"We wrote this letter because of how deeply connected our community feels to these journalists," the group's co-founder Basem Farajallah told Byline Times.

"On a personal level, they were the voices who covered our stories and showed us the truth about what was happening to our loved ones. It is therefore deeply painful for us to see them being targeted and killed."

"Most of these journalists are locals to many of our community members - we know their families, their schools, and their neighbourhoods. In many cases, we can say that we know them personally." Farajallah himself grew up in Jabalia, alongside the family of Al-Sharif. "They are great, friendly and supportive people," he said.

Journalists, Farajallah says, "have played a vital role to show the truth" to the wider world. Checking in on his sister who lives in Gaza, he recalls her response: "You outside know better than us," she told him. "You can watch the news, while we have no electricity or TVs."

"Through this message," he adds, "we aim to make the public aware of the grave consequences that can arise from arms supplied to Israel, and how such weapons can be - and have been - used. We view the deliberate targeting of journalists as a clear and serious war crime, and we strongly believe that Britain must not be complicit in such actions."

Figures from the Committee to Protect Journalists, Gaza officials, and the International Federation of Journalists vary - but all put the number of journalists killed since Israel's offensive began on 7 October 2023 at over 180. The number is potentially much higher, according to the Watson Institute's Cost of War Project, which has described Gaza as "the worst ever conflict for reporters".

'Th...

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'Broken Britain. Lawless London'.

The way some politicians and political commentators denigrate our capital city and country makes you wonder why they choose to live here.

London, they'll tell you, is some dark, dystopian backwater. A city where, whenever you step out onto the street, you will be the victim of a violent mugging or worse.

This image - this fiction - is not the London I know and millions love. It's not the London I was born and raised in. It's not where I studied, where I met my wife, where I raised my daughters. And it's not the city I'm now proud to serve as Mayor.

London is the greatest city in the world.

It's a place that's bursting with ambition, innovation, and creativity - down every street and in every borough, you'll find some of the world's finest people, theatre, music, food, and art.

In London, you can get a world-class university education as we boast more top universities than any other city. Or you can get a job at one of the most exciting, established multinational or fast-growing companies on Earth.

The London Londoners know is a place for doers and dreamers, of every colour and creed. A city where you are free to be who you want to be, love who you want to love, and celebrate whatever culture or background you come from.

That's why people from across the UK, and around the world, come and make this city their home - including, in recent months, a record number of Americans.

And, despite what the doomsters say, things haven't been getting worse. Across many areas, they've been getting better.

If you're living in London today, the air you breathe is now dramatically cleaner than it was 10 years ago, thanks to our policies.

If you want to travel around our city, you can now use the night tube, the Elizabeth Line, and the Superloop, and a cycling network that has increased more than fivefold since 2016.

If you're a young Londoner, when you go to a state primary school, as well as a first-rate education, you can benefit from a free nutritious meal.

I am well aware that our capital city has challenges - from the cost of living to the housing crisis. As Mayor, the safety of Londoners is what keeps me up at night.

But what those who peddle the 'lawless London' line won't tell you is that despite significant central government cuts to the budget of the Metropolitan Police since 2010, fatal shootings, burglaries, and violent assaults causing injury have all decreased since I became Mayor in 2016. The number of homicides recorded last year was half that in 2003, and murder rates in our capital are significantly lower than in major US cities, including New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago. They are also lower than those in Paris, Madrid, Barcelona, Toronto, and Berlin.

And according to official statistics, you are less likely to be a victim of violent crime with injury in London than you are elsewhere in England and Wales.

I know many Londoners are worried about phone theft, which is why we are increasing the number of police officers patrolling hotspots in the West End by 50%. This has already led to a reduction of personal robbery which I'm determined to build on.

Of course, I'm not complacent. I don't say this to sugarcoat. One future stolen, one act of violence, one home burgled, is one too many. But the facts show: we're making progress.

So, if improvements are being made, why is there such a concerted effort - often led by those who pose as patriots - to talk down our great capital city?

The fact is: these people can't stand what London represents.

They believe a city that is as diverse and progressive as ours cannot be allowed to thrive. Because if it does, it makes a mockery of their entire worldview.

We expose their politics for what it is: fearmongering nonsense.

But the fact is, whether they like it or not, London is a success story.

It ...

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Earlier this week on the BBC News Channel, a presenter blithely asked their guest: "Obviously international organisations like the BBC cannot go in [to Gaza]… so Al Jazeera is using local people there. Are they able to operate truly independently?"

The words "local" and "independently" were doing a lot of heavy lifting in this statement. What is it about being "local", after all, that must render a journalist irredeemably biased and unable to report accurately? Why are Palestinian journalists forever belittled and subjected to this accusation?

The interview was meant to discuss 28-year-old Palestinian journalist Anas Al Sharif, who had been killed along with the rest of Al Jazeera's entire Gaza City team, in a targeted Israeli attack on their media tent.

Anas had been reporting bravely since 2023, and Israel produced no convincing evidence for its claim that he was head of a Hamas cell. Nonetheless, a separate BBC presenter on the Breakfast show earlier that day reported: "Anas has been accused by Israel of leading a Hamas cell, something he denied." There was no caveat around the reliability of Israel as a source.

Between these two BBC presenter quotes, you would be forgiven for thinking that the journalism coming out of Gaza is compromised, and that this is the root of calls to allow international journalists into the strip.

For nearly two years, Israel's wildest claims have been allowed to gain purchase in mainstream media - repeated by widely trusted outlets like the BBC, Sky, CNN, the New York Times, with little pushback, context, or verification.

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Many of these claims have elided both Gaza's key workers - journalists, doctors, teachers, civil ministers - and its civilian infrastructure of hospitals, schools, homes - with Hamas' military wing and ongoing operations, positioning them all as legitimate targets.

Little work has been done to make clear that the military and civil wings are separate, or that hospitals and schools are protected under international law. A number of us within the BBC warned the executive that this was dangerous, and that it had to critically engage with every source - including the Israeli military.

My focus here is on journalists in particular, and the work Israel has done to delegitimise them. Israel's modus operandi - throughout what many aid organisations now call a genocide - has been to claim that a journalist is an active Hamas combatant and kill them, sometimes alongside their whole families. Hossam Shabat. Eman Shanti. Anas Al Sharif. The list goes on.

The blue press vest - an emblem of protection - is now a target in Gaza. The Committee to Protect Journalists says 184 Palestinian journalists and media workers have been killed by Israel since October 2023.

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Propping up this claim that journalists in Gaza are largely Hamas combatants is a Western media landscape that refuses to align with Palestinian journalists as credible colleagues, deserving of journalistic protections.

The insinuation behind calling them "local people", operating with questionable independence, is that they are inherently "biased": unable to report accurately because they exhibit passion, are close to the story, know the local language, have the trust of their communities, and have specialist knowledge.

These are all skills that, far from o...

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Since journalists are not allowed into Gaza freely, to hear what is happening there we must speak directly to those living amid the rubble.

According to the International Federation of Journalists, at least 195 journalists and media workers, including 181 Palestinians, have been killed since 7 October 2023, making this the deadliest war against reporting in recent history.

So we have interviewed a mother and nurse, Alaa Jaber.

Alaa has with her, in a battered tent in near Deir al-Balah, central Gaza, her two children; Ayla (2 years, six months) and Muhammed (1 year, six months). She is also with her husband Ibrahim, and is looking after her mother.

Josiah: Thank you for speaking, Alaa. Tell me about you and what you were doing before the conflict.

Alaa: My name is Alaa Jaber, I am 27 years old. I am currently living in the middle of the Gaza Strip. I was working as a nurse before the destruction, and now I volunteer my nursing work to those in need if I can and have the means to do so.

Josiah: How are you and your family surviving?

Alaa: I am now with my husband and children, and I am responsible for my mother since my father was killed. She is 70 and suffers from high blood pressure and diabetes. My husband, my daughter, and I have all been injured in the war.

I was displaced from my home after it was bombed. My father's house near Deir al-Balah was also bombed, and he was martyred on October 26th 2023.

My daughter, Ayla, my husband, and I, when I was pregnant with Muhammad, were injured and pulled out from under the rubble. I have burns on my body and Ayla has burns on her hands. My husband has injuries to his head and foot.

I was seven months pregnant with my child [Muhammed]. When I had labour pains, the occupation forces were targeting the ambulances. There were no cars to take me, so I walked, bleeding, until I reached the hospital. He was born prematurely, twenty days after my injury and as a result of what happened to me.

Because the hospital was so crowded with the wounded, murdered and injured, a quarter of an hour after his birth, they ordered me to leave the hospital. After giving birth, I suffered from postpartum complications due to lack of medication, care, and water.

Now we have no source of income and nothing. I live on people's help and we go for days at a time without eating. My daughter suffers from malnutrition. Muhammed suffered from intestinal obstruction.

Josiah: What is happening with aid where you are? Are you receiving any? Have you had to relocate?

Alaa: We are now in a tent and we are not receiving any assistance. Our situation is very difficult. My children need help.

Josiah: Do you witness the bombings and shootings? What have you seen in terms of the violence?

Alaa: Yes, of course. There is no safe place at all. We are bombed daily next to us and in front of us, and we've been displaced more than once. There is no humanitarian safe place as they claim.

These are some of our daily struggles.

Josiah: Do you have access to electricity?

Alaa: There is no electricity in Gaza to begin with, and I wish I could get a battery to light my children at night because they are afraid of the dark, as are all children.

Josiah: Are Hamas still active where you are? What role do you think they still have in the conflict?

Alaa: We cannot talk about political matters because of their seriousness, and we do not have the slightest information about what they are thinking. We are just victims between the two parties.

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Josiah: You have said you saw aid being dropped into the sea. Is any aid getting through?

Alaa: Most of them fall into the sea and the others are in the red areas where no one can go. A little arrives, but armed thieves seize it.

Josiah: I hear any food you get is very expensive - can you tell me what ...