It's been 5 months since the ceasefire in Gaza was announced. It's been two since Donald Trump's board of peace met for the first time, but since then it seems like the situation has become stuck somewhere between phase one and phase two. Meanwhile, the situation in Gaza and the West Bank remains critical. With that in mind, I sat down with the Palestinian foreign minister. Foreign Minister, thank you so much for your time. How confident are you that the comprehensive peace plan for Gaza can bring a viable political solution for the region?

I think we need to remain confident that there needs to be a solution. And that solution has to have some pillars. One of them might be the board of peace, which starts with Gaza, but needs to transcend beyond Gaza to look at the entirety of the occupied Palestinian territory because if we're talking about peace, we're talking about one entity, one indivisible entity, that is the occupied state of Palestine today, which spans the borders of the 1967, including East Jerusalem, the Gaza Strip, and the West Bank. Because you said in your panel a short while ago, it's been 5 months now since a ceasefire was announced. It's been 2 months since the board of peace met, and yet the situation on the ground in Gaza

and in the West Bank is critical, if not still worsening. Yes, it is worsening. And you can imagine people who have been living under such brutality for 30 months with monumental needs and expectations are not getting the basic needs met. Now they're thinking there is this board of peace. Countries but signatures were put on documents. There is a committee that has been formed. There are layers in that board of peace. Why isn't Why aren't we seeing things moving on the ground? People want immediate relief. And the more we delay this, the more the situation becomes worse. And we see today from reports that are coming out,

people are living on piles of garbage, not only rubble. And the garbage is infested and rats are eating the toes and the ears of children, men, and women. Do you think it is because now that a ceasefire has been signed and people around the world have seen that news, they saw the pictures of the board of peace meeting? Do you fear that they have now moved on? We have the war in Iran. Do you think that they think that the conflict in Gaza has now finished? Well, we need to remind the world that the conflict is ongoing. Nothing has finished. And there

are commitments by the world to stop this charade. Yes, there was diversion of focus with the Iran, US, and Israel war, but the core issue remains the Palestinian problem. The Palestinian problems need to be tackled because there are immediate needs that are unfulfilled and becoming worse by the day. And any delay will uh make the situation worse. And also, the main reason for this conflict has still not been resolved. And arguably, until that is the case, there can't be any talk about a long-term peace. Yes. That's why the peace has several pillars. And those pillars include respect to international law, respect of previous obligations, respect of the New York declaration, respect of the Arab peace initiative, respect of the

inalienable rights of the Palestinian people, which have been violated also. And let me ask you about Lebanon because we are just hours into a ceasefire and already we have seen multiple violations by Israel of that ceasefire. Um this has been your experience in Palestine for so many years. Yes, that's a trend by Israel. Every time there is a ceasefire, there are violations. Israel agreed to the ceasefire in Gaza, and Israel continues to violate the ceasefire multiple times, hundreds of times, and it's expected to do the same on the Lebanese front. And many some have said, you know, the UN has said this is not self-defense. We have seen the same tactics employed in Lebanon as we saw

employed in Gaza in terms of those who are too sick to evacuate, those who are too poor to evacuate, emergency services attacks. These are the same things. This must not come as a surprise to you. No, it's not surprising at all because as I said, it's a trend by Israel. And Israel uses the same tactics all over. benefits from continuing conflict. It benefits locally, it benefits internationally, it benefits because of personal gains of people in power in Israel. And Israel says it very clearly that it wants to continue this conflict until it develops this idea of the

greater Israel that infringes on the sovereignty and independence on all neighboring countries. And how much do you believe that Donald Trump, the US president, has been drawn into that and in some may argue manipulated by the Israeli prime minister into achieving the aims that Israel has always had? Well, I think the whole world today, all the reports coming out from different parts of the world, point in that direction. But we hope that the United States look at the matter differently because if you want to forge peace, then peace needs to be built on the pillars that puts all sides to account, including Israel. In the West Bank, Israeli settlers this week blocked access to a Palestinian school.

Um we have had strong words from the international community when it comes to rising settler violence in the West Bank. Yet when it comes to action, we have seen very little. Why is that? Israel intensifies its violence against the West Bankers, exploiting the conflict elsewhere. With the war we've seen intensifying violations by the settlers and the settler movement on the West Bank. It's not enough to talk about settler violence or settler terror. What we want to see is actual measures taken on the ground to curtail this kind of terror.

We need to see it affecting policy in Israel because the settlers are an arm of the government and they are protected and weaponed by the government because ministers who are settlers themselves serve on the Israeli government, and they are the ones that are emboldening the settler movement. We have also seen in the last couple of years or so more and more countries across the world recognizing the state of Palestine. And you said in your panel there are positives to that, especially when it comes to legal accountability. But what more needs to happen aside from that? Look, recognitions are irreversible, and this is important because if we want to move into a path of peace, we need to look at the measures that are

irreversible and measures that hold Israel to account. So recognition is extremely important, and we're asking the few countries that have remained today, 160 countries recognized over 80%. Those that have remained, they need to come forward if they claim they are for international law and compliance with international law, this is the time to recognize the state of Palestine. And Foreign Minister, I know you have to go, so my very, very final question. Turkey has been a great friend of Palestine. Um a large part of this diplomacy forum is focused on how to achieve that long-term resolution. That must be a comfort at least in increasingly turbulent times. Yes, Turkey has been a good friend to the

Palestinians. It has been at the forefront in humanitarian assistance in Gaza, in development assistance on the West Bank, in its interventions in East Jerusalem. And this is what is expected from a friendly country like Turkey and the friendly people of Turkey. We expect that to continue, and we expect dialogues that take place in forums like this to help people talk about the issues because in the final analysis, we know that the military route is an unstarter, and things will be challenged and solved at a negotiating table and through dialogue. Foreign Minister, thank you so much for your time. I appreciate it. You're welcome.