UK Column News - 1st October 2025

Good afternoon. It's just gone 1:00 on Wednesday the 1st of October 2025. Welcome to UK Column News.

I'm your host, Charles Mannett, and I'm joined by Livelink by Vanessa Bailey, who's in Lebanon and Diane Rasmussen from the North of England. Now in today's programme we will be focusing on the fact that all paths appear to be leading to war and that will be the theme with an in depth look at the United States, Gaza, Iran, Israel and of course the United Kingdom, as well as the destruction of our environment in the name of preserving it. But we're going to start the

programme with Home Affairs in that the Labour Party conference is winding up today in Liverpool and has been characterised by tit for tat insults traded with reform now viewed as the looming threat to the Starmer regime. Now the BBC of course have had a field day with this and we'll just look through some of the bylines. We won't dignify them necessarily with any in depth comment. But Starmer talking about how he might change international law due to the pressure surrounding migration.

Of course, the great football of the moment. David Lammy having backtrack on, backtracked on remarks about Nigel Farage singing Hitler Youth songs, of course, which he cannot possibly substantiate. And then we go on to Tony Blair. We will be dealing with him later in the programme, at least obliquely I'm afraid, but remarkably, as Patrick articulated on Friday, set to serve on Trump's board of peace for Gaza. And indeed the question is asked, Trump trust Blair but others don't.

Could he govern Gaza? Quite remarkable question to be asked by any stretch of the imagination. Now the wheels have absolutely appeared to come off. As Ben was articulating on Monday's programme, the Labour Starmer regime appears to be heading for the ditch. And as part of this we've reported on the idea, the recently floated of a mandatory yet free digital identity card and indeed the petition which went with it.

Now it's interesting to note the top live petitions which are out there on the government website at the moment and what it is exactly that they pertain to. We've got, in reverse order, a petition about introducing offshore detention or mass deportation for illegal migrants with nearly half a million signatures, over half a million, which we've broadcast a lot about before repealing the Online Safety Act again 544,000

there. We've had yet another petition for a general election on nearly 1,000,000 signatures and of course do not introduce digital identity cards at over 2 and a half million signatures. Now, there are of course other metrics by which we may gauge the success or otherwise of the Labour Party. And one must be careful of course, when examining statistics or indeed any kind of analysis dealing with numbers and data.

But this is how more in common are predicting voting behaviour of the public at were a general election to be cast now with what they call MRP, which is multi level regression with post stratification. Essentially a modelling process using data from a voting intention poll to work out how people will vote based on demographics, previous voting behaviour and information about their constituency.

But the central issue simmering for years and brought to the ball this summer is, of course, the immigration crisis crisis, my design and in both senses so far, the way that it's practically been put in front of the people and indeed the way it's been reported now on that Diane attended an event in Newcastle weekend pertaining to exactly this issue. So we're just going to bring Diane into the programme now. Diane, welcome. What exactly happened in

Newcastle at the weekend? Yes. Thanks, Charles, and hello, everyone. It's great to be here today. I just went to an event on Saturday which I think was partially precipitated by the fact that Ben Habib was in Newcastle on Saturday to launch his new Advanced UK party, which was originally cancelled and then rescheduled to somewhere else.

We don't really know where it was because it was not made public and I was not intending to go to that particular event, but I did want to see what was going on in the city around that time. So there was a UKIP March that started down at the Quayside for those of you who are familiar with Newcastle. And then there were other groups of, I guess we could say potential agitators from the other side. We could say Tony, Tony Robinson

types of oppositions. So those of us who are maybe on the sort of we was called leftist, I guess you could say it's really hard to say because they had so many things going on. But we could see a lot of action from both sides. But the so-called leftist side, for lack of a better term, was definitely the largest and the angriest and the most active. And obviously one of their main topics of, of issue was refugees.

So both parties eventually ended up down towards the hotel, which is the migrant hotel, the Newbridge Hotel in Newcastle. And we got between the police lines of the two groups. But I've got some video here of the angrier side of the two. If we could play that please. So what was really interesting about that is as you saw, we were able to get between the police lines as by saying that we were part of the media, but the police were so relaxed about the whole thing.

I didn't see a single police staff that looked at all worried about what was going on. It just seemed like another day on the job, Charles. Absolutely, Don, good for you getting out there, but also, you know, being able to see it first hand how the issue is is literally one of division with people segregated and separated both physically but also psychologically as well. And that is exactly what seems to be driven by reform presenting themselves as an

alternative. But as we see from Richard Tice's Twitter profile, he's recently visited Israel. And of course he falls in line with almost every other politician of every colour and persuasion. And in this instance, rather remarkably, he has gone all the way to Israel to, in his words, apologise for the appalling betrayal by Labour. He refers, of course, to the recognition of the Palestinian state by the Labour Party.

Recently. He follows up his tweet by thanking Gideon SAR for the meeting they had and of course saying that Reform UK will be relied upon by Israel to stand by or stand with Israel. He tweets about his visit to Jerusalem and of course he lays wreath saying in memory to the victims of the Holocaust on behalf of Reform UK.

Now not necessarily to have a go specifically at that might there might be a whole range of reasons that he would seek to do it. However, the optics of course are such when one considers exactly the target of the migration rhetoric from Reform, and of course with the Holocaust Memorial Bill in play at the moment, it is worth noting that this is the line from Reform. Now one should always follow the money and in doing so that leads us to Christopher Harbourne

shown here by Donation Watch as the major donor to Reform, with the absolutely outstripping any other donors by quite some considerable margin. And he is the major shareholder in Kinetic, the arms manufacturer shown by the Campaign against Arms Trade, of course as a provider of weapons to Israel's. Just finally and quickly we just look at the policies from Reform.

Fairly innocuous photograph of Nigel Farage, but it just seems curious to look at the detail of him holding the very device which of course enables digital ID in the 1st place. So with that in mind, I would just conclude by saying it. It's been interesting to note that he and Tice have visited the Bank of England recently and met the Governor and are talking about a cosy relationship with the Governor.

And indeed Farage, whilst saying that he's opposed to central bank digital currency, acknowledging of course that the suggestion that exists in the 1st place is to prevent fraud, which of course he is not at all aiming to dismiss. So there are a number of ways in which Reform are being presented as an alternative to the Labour Party. My contention, I think from the way in which UK column has examined this over the past few years, is that this appears to be nothing more than a false binary.

And the only difference really between a Reform government and a Labour government would be the speed with which reform might change anything. They could simply be operating in a different gear. Now that takes us on to what's been happening over on the other side of the Atlantic, and in particular what Pete Hegseth has been doing. We reported recently that he is now running what's called the Department of War and he's been speaking to all ranks.

And he would certainly win an award for hyperbole. He he spoke for 45 minutes. He quoted Donald Trump as saying that the United States has the strongest, most powerful, most lethal and most prepared military on the planet. And he certainly started as he meant to carry on. So what we'll do now is just go to a video of him at the during the in the early stages of his speech. And then I'm going to ask Vanessa for a bit of comment on

on what it is that he said. The Joint Chiefs, generals, Admirals, commanders, officers, senior enlisted, NCO's enlisted in every member of our American military. Good morning, good morning, and welcome to the War Department because the era of the Department of Defence is over. You see, the motto of my first platoon was those who long for

peace must prepare for war. So this is about that he's, he's very much trying to leverage his own experiences in the military, imagining that he's he's one of them and that therefore they should listen to him and, and trying to sort of get them on side that way. He goes on to talk about a whole load of other things, talking about more innovation, more AI,

more cyber effects. Interestingly, in contrast to what's been going on in the United Kingdom, of course, he talks about onshoring all of their critical components, which of course is not the case in the United Kingdom with so many things, particularly being manufactured by Israel. But Vanessa, obviously you've been looking very much at what what he said. I mean in in terms of his approach to those that were present.

What are your thoughts on that? Well, I mean, the entire speech for me was extremely sinister based on the context of looming regional war here, both against Iran, Lebanon, Yemen, Iraq and so on. And, and the chatter here that that war is imminent. But, but I find it extraordinary this, this claim that the era of defence is over. We're in the era of war. And that echoes, I can't actually remember which of the many British leaders that said exactly the same during, I think the Ukraine war.

So, you know, I mean, it's, it's to A, to a degree, American spokespeople now and members of Trump's administration are very brazen in outlying their agenda. Yes, absolutely.

And I think is it very interesting that one of the points he was he was making, which seemed to contradict itself, was he was talking about what needing military leaders who are apolitical and, and acknowledging that there had been a sort of, you know, state of political riding off the rails of the armed forces and that they were going to correct that, which of course would apparently be political.

So we'll just have a listen now to to what he went on to say concerning that that sort of apparent discrepancy. This administration has done a great deal from day one to remove the social justice, politically correct and toxic ideological garbage that had infected our department to RIP out the politics. No more identity months, DEI offices, dudes in dresses. No more climate change worship. No more division, distraction or gender delusions.

No more debris. As I've said before and will say again, we are done with that shit. I've made it my mission to uproot the obvious distractions that made us less capable and less lethal. That said, the War Department requires the next step. Underneath the woke garbage is a deeper problem and a more important problem that we are fixing and fixing fast. Common sense is back at the White House, so making the necessary changes is actually pretty straightforward.

President Trump expects it. And the litmus test for these changes? It's pretty simple. Would I want my eldest son, who is 15 years old, eventually joining the types of formations that we are currently wielding? If in any way the answer to that is no, or even yes? But then we're doing something wrong. Because my son is no more important than any other American citizen who Dons the cloth of our nation.

He is no more important than your Son, all precious souls made in the image and likeness of God. There you go. I mean, he's doing grand job. You know, for anyone who's receptive to to that sort of thing, he really is pulling at all the sort of heartstrings and, you know, invoking parenthood and all that kind of thing. What struck me about that, Vanessa, was that he talks about, you know, the armed forces being exactly the right state in order that one's son

might consider joining. OK, fair enough. Let's take that at face value. Of course, what that enables him to completely gloss over is the sorts of things that the United States military might actually be engaged in. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I again, I just find this deeply sinister when one considers that effectively what he's saying is you need to be prepared to go and fight for Israel. This has nothing to do with

American patriotism. This literally is to do with being allied to and loyal to Israel, Right? And when with the ramping up of the war machine against West Asia and against Iran, that's exactly what he's saying. So what he's actually saying is that you all need to be behind Israel. There can be no political or religious deviation from this. And when he's talking about Christianity, of course he's talking about Christian Zionism. He's not talking about true Christianity.

Yeah, that's exactly it. And one wonders how many of the audience, well, I mean, there's two things really. You know, this presumed is being broadcast first of all, to his immediate audience, obviously, and then across all the various units who are supposed to sort of be receiving this directly from the, you know, from the the war secretary. But. But I, I think, you know, one of the questions is why, Why are we saying it? Why is it on? Why is it on YouTube?

Why is it on Twitter? I mean, this is sort of internal and yet exactly like you're articulating, there's a message there that he doesn't need to explicitly say. But those who know. No. Yeah. I mean, the hype, the hype has been ongoing for more than a week. I mean, I mean, you know, everyone's been chattering about, oh, God, this upcoming meeting with all the generals, it's unprecedented and so on and so forth.

And it's deliberately there to to, let's say, swing popular opinion behind what America is going to do next. Yeah, that's exactly right. I've just got one more short clip and then we can play the the rest in extra. Let's just listen to how he how he sort of wrapped up. These same reforms happened before World War 2 as well. General George Marshall and Secretary of War Henry Stimson did the same thing and we won a World War because of it.

As it happens, when he started the job, Chairman Kane gave me a frame and a photo to hang in my office. A matching frame and photo hangs in his. It's a photo of Marshall and Stimson preparing for World War 2. Those two leaders famously kept the door open between their offices for the entirety of the war. They worked together, civilian and uniform, every single day. Chairman Kane and I do the same. There is no daylight between us. Our doors are always open.

Our job together is to ensure our military is led by the very best, ready to answer the nation's call. He's got some pretty grand ideas. And I should also point out that in his in his speech, he also said that he needs a force that is going to send people to dangerous places to find those who would do our nation harm and deliver justice on behalf of the American people in close and

brutal combat, if necessary. So this is just, you know, sort of Expeditionary talk, trying to invoke kind of warrior spirit and all the rest of it. And as you say, a lot of a lot of judeo-christian rhetoric Now, Vanessa, that's sort of going to lead us into the next part because of course he is. He's apparently preparing for a war. But I suspect he must know that if there is to be, you know, specifically the war, I said earlier we're going to be

talking about the the Gaza plan. We've referred to Tony Blair. So, so what's your analysis of the, you know, the so-called Gaza peace plan? Well, I mean the Gaza peace plan is really a reiteration of what we've seen many times since October the 7th in various guises and forms. And of course the Tony Blair Institute was exposed as having played a part in some of the planning sessions previously. The fact that Tony Blair is now front and centre should be no

surprise. He was the Middle East so-called peace envoy previously. He's hated in the Middle East for his infanticidal role in Iraq and and in the entire region. So to put this into context, I'm just going to basically show a couple of excerpts from

Netanyahu's speech at the UNGA. Glad to say that the majority of nations walked out when he started speaking, except for, of course, those that are fully aligned with Israel and the genocide in Palestine. So as part of his speech, he basically rejected the idea entirely of a Palestinian state. He said giving the Palestinians a state one mile from Jerusalem after October the 7th is like giving Al Qaeda a state one mile from New York City after 911. This is Shia madness.

Israel will not allow you to shove a terrorist state down our throats. Well, that is super interesting for me because of course we'll come on to that at the. Recent UNGA was attended by former members of al Qaeda, in fact former founder members of al Qaeda. But let's have a listen to another section of this speech in which he points out that it is the majority view in Israel that no state of Palestine will ever exist.

So let's just play this. We will not commit national suicide because you don't have the guts to face down a hostile media and anti-Semitic mobs demanding Israel's blood. And I want you to grasp something else which is also distorted in the media. I say this not only in my name or the name of my government, but on behalf of all the people of Israel. Last year there was a vote in the Knesset, our parliament, whether or not to oppose the imposition of a Palestinian state.

You want to guess what the results were? Out of 120 members of our parliament, 99 voted against and only 9 supported. That's over 90%. Which of course is what we've been saying since October the 7th and even before then, that virtually the majority of the population of Israel are in favour of the ethnic cleansing project to rid what they consider the state of Israel

from any Palestinian presence. But as I mentioned, of course, interesting that he mentions al Qaeda and New York when Al Qaeda were given red carpet treatment in New York at the UNGA. And this is Jelani meeting with Roland Ronald, sorry, Lauda, who is head of the Jewish Congress and of course an Uber Zionist and a great friend of Netanyahu. And they were discussing the Syria Israel peace agreement and so on. So, you know, it, it, it, it's is his entire speech is, is a

litany of hypocrisy. But I'm going to come on to the actual peace plan, the points of which have been revealed in multiple media outlets. This is in the Times of Israel, the 21 points plan for ending the Gaza war and creating a pathway to a Palestinian state, which of course it doesn't. So I've basically summarised the points that were laid out in this article and we'll run through them very quickly.

Of course, first of all, Gaza to be de radicalised and there to be education or re education programs to change mindsets of Palestinians. In other words, to force them to abandon any idea of Palestinian statehood or even justice for the 100 years plus of ethnic cleansing and genocide that has been ongoing since 1917. It will be redeveloped for the benefit of the people of Palestine. Of course we know that's not true. We've covered multiple times on UK column the potential for a

multinational free trade zone. Sorry, can I just go back to, to that slide quickly the first one? Yes, thank you. So then IOF will halt operations, gradual withdrawal. So they're not committing to withdrawing to full withdrawal immediately. Within 48 hours after Israel publicly accepts the deal, all hostages, living or dead Israeli hostages will be returned. And after this, Israel will free several 100 security prisoners and 1000 Gazans arrested during the war.

Now, of course, this doesn't take into account the 9010 thousand Palestinian prisoners that are still being held as hostages effectively in Israel, Israeli jails, and who are being effectively tortured, raped, abused on a daily if not hourly basis. Then we get on to a few more points from the peace plan. So allegedly Hamas members can safely leave Gaza or accept amnesty to remain if of course, they promise to disarm and give up all ideas of Palestinian

statehood. Hamas has actually come forward requesting amendments and they've pointed out, well, does that mean that we're not going to get assassinated in Qatar or in the country that we decide to go to, as has been happening?

Of course, aid and rehabilitation will take place, distribution of the aid by UN agencies, although they've banned UNRWA and Red Crescent and the very high chance that Gaza Humanitarian Foundation will be allowed back in, who of course of themselves been committing crimes against Palestinians, trying to to reach aid centres, A transitional governance by Palestinian technocrats under the supervision of the US, Arab and EU partners.

So in other words, total sort of disenfranchisement of Palestinians effectively in Gaza. Then it goes on. There will be a free trade zone in Gaza, which is exactly what we've been talking about. This creation of a free trade zone under the control of the US and the Zionist bloc. Opportunities for Gazans if they decide to remain, which I presume will mean to act as slave labour for the free trade zone and industry that will be under the control of the Zionist total demilitarization.

Regional partners of Israel will provide security guarantees. US and Arab security will effectively occupy Gaza after PA reform because of course, the Palestinian Authority, Netanyahu also attacks them in his UNGA speech. So after they've been reformed and all the former measures have been taken, then there will be discussion of Palestinian statehood. So, so this is not offering anything. This is effectively saying you will all come into line. You will do everything that

Israel requires of you. And what's going to happen, it will push Hamas into a corner. They've already come forward with a request for amendments and a request for further time to consider the peace plan and to come back with their answer. But of course, what Israel is doing is pushing Hamas in a corner where they'll be deemed the belligerent because they don't agree with all the conditions that effectively completely disenfranchise Palestinians.

In Gaza, President Donald Trump is declaring it a historic day for peace. Hala Jaba, a Lebanese journalist, has a different concept of that. She says behind the fanfare of one of the greatest days in civilization lies humiliation, exile and a trusteeship that Palestinians have never asked for and in fact, they've fought

against. And finally, if we look at this is a recent tripartite trilateral phone call with Donald Trump in Netanyahu, where in fact they've also said to Qatar who was recently bombed by Israel, we promise not to bomb you again. And so Qatar as effectively as David Meno said, come into line with the so-called peace plan. You can read his his disgust at that, of course. And he mentions again that Tony Blair is heavily involved. And finally, if we do, we have a last video.

Sorry, I'm getting. We don't, but no. OK, that's fine. That's it. Sorry. OK, now thanks very much. And of course, the other thing to point out, which you mentioned before we started recording, oh sorry, started the program was that, you know, in a way it's an indication of the sort of incredibly short nature of the new cycle that this in effect is being sold as something that's completely novel and hasn't happened before. But of course, extremely 1 sided and exactly just a rehash of of

what's gone past so many times. So we'll, we'll absolutely be talking about that more in extra. Now that moves on to talk about what the UK column does. And if you are not yet a member, then please do consider joining. We have a wealth of resources on the website itself in terms of all sorts of materials on any topic you might consider looking and looking up or looking into. If you are able to support us then please click here on the front page as shown on the image

on screen. As the evenings draw in a bit and it cools down you might consider something from the UK column shop. And yesterday Sandy Adams's interview with Locke in Texas about communitarianism, little little known but something that really should be well understood, has gone very well. So please do look at the website

to catch up with that. And going out tomorrow is the next instalment of Military Matters, Brian Garish and I dealing with matters of conscription and recruitment and indeed particularly pertinent given the subject matter of today's news programme that goes out at Thursday, sorry, 1:00 tomorrow, Thursday. And then a reminder of our event in York, which of course is sold out as far as in person tickets, but there are still tickets available for the live stream.

So please do consider joining us. And I should remind you that if you do buy a ticket for the live stream, you do not have to sit down and watch it at the time it will be available to you thereafter.

That will also apply to people who are coming in person and you will have access to and Andy Wakefield's amazing film, Protocol 7. Andy Wakefield will be there speaking about the way in which his career was derailed by his challenging of the Pharmaceutical industry, particularly on the issue of vaccines, and how he's gone on to make a successful career as a film producer. And of course, we'll be talking about the making of Protocol 7.

Liz Evans will be talking about medical ethics, in which she has a considerable wealth of knowledge. Ben Rubin, We'll be talking about the impact that the National Health Service has made since its establishment and indeed the questioning, the very process by which it was set up. Tess Laurie, of course, talking about her, what drove her to set up and run the World Council for Health.

And Julian Rose will be speaking about the inextricable link between human health and soil health and how important life on the land really is in pertaining to are very existent. So please do if you can join us for that live stream, go to the UK column website and get your ticket. Now I said that the theme running throughout today's programme was going to be war and on the propaganda side of it, which might be a little bit harsh in the mind of the editor

of Soldier magazine. I'm going to have a look at the publication that serves the British Army soldier the September issue entitled leading by example on the front page. Interesting to note, First off on the inside cover is an advert from Help for Heroes talking about readying people for Sibley St. just to show how mission creep works. Because, of course, Help for Heroes were set up to deal with people who were returning from Afghanistan in particular with

injuries and wounds. And of course, this is very relevant to what we're talking about because in a sense, Pete Hegseth was referring to the sort of skill fate of a generation who've not been involved in kinetic action and wanting to be able to maintain contact, as it were, with the

enemy. Also advertising in the magazine are arms manufacturers and the defence trade fair, DSE, Sorry DSEI, which happened in London, the Defence and Security Equipment International and we'll come back to that a little bit later. Also Viking, again advertising their weapon systems, but notably Elbit.

Of course, we've talked about Elbit a lot on the news, the Israeli weapons manufacturer who have a plant near Bristol which has been the subject of a lot of activity with the now prescribed group Palestine Action. But what I want to draw your attention to is their mortar, 120 millimetre mortar system called Sling, which they're saying delivers enhanced lethality, deployability and survivability for light forces. But the key bit here is that they're saying it's

operationally proven. Now how are they qualifying that? Well, we go to Jane's defence, who ran an article on this back in January of this year, talking about upgrades and developments, this particular item of equipment and saying I quote Jane's learnt that the Iron Sting munition is undergoing development in response to feedback from the ongoing conflict in the Middle East.

So there we have it. Jane's is confirming that Soldier Magazine, not exactly an internal publication but certainly one that does get put out to serving army in particular is advertising the very weapons systems which are being proven in Gaza. And the suggestion there obviously is that the British Army should be preparing to purchase such equipment and indeed to get people trained up on that because they know it works in Gaza.

So that is quite a thought in considering exactly where it is that that soldier has has gone in terms of advertising. Now, the other thing I wanted to bring out in terms of propaganda was there's a there's a whole piece on sort of young people and university students joining the university officer training

corps. This again comes out in the interview tomorrow that Brian and I sorry, the the discussion that Brian and I had military matters, but but what it bears relation to is the pledge to recruit more and more people into the armed forces without having to use conscriptions. So they say. And I've got on screen now the conscription and national Service document from the 28th of March this year. And just to enlarge the picture on screen, it's no coincidence that the front rank shown there

are women. And of course there is a push to make 30% of the armed forces women where the current percentage currently is at 12% with no real idea of how they will actually do that. Now the other thing I wanted to to bring in, which was mentioned by Ben on Monday, was Estonia. Now he was talking particularly in regard to their digital

transformation. And I think it mustn't be forgotten that alongside this, they have been absolutely instrumental in the NATO plans and indeed sort of European defence plans in order to provide what they're describing as being an opposition to Russia and the United Kingdom armed forces been involved very much with Estonia and Estonians. So it's interesting to note that at the same event, the DSEI, they unveiled a 10 billion defence spending plan.

And of course, they echo Pete Hegseth's words on Twitter talking about standing for peace through strength. However, they do actually trace this a little bit further back than Hegseth because their National Defence Development Plan, which runs up until 2031, goes back to 2021. And they talk about the human resources side of it, which of course they by which they mean that they need to conscript people for their armed forces and they're planning on an

uplift of that. I mean, OK, the point very well made by Ben is that Estonia obviously is a very small and not very populous country. But nonetheless, this is the direction of travel. And I think with that in mind, with what Hegseth has said about about sort of being absolutely prepared for war and all this strength through peace, we're now going to go back to Vanessa. Because of course, as discussed many times in UK column, Iran is so often the focus of all of

this sort of rhetoric. And quite probably more than that, Vanessa. Yeah, absolutely. So we're just going to have a very quick look at what particularly Israeli media has been saying. This is in Israel high on Israel and Iran on a collision course. This is all in the last few days. Israel and Iran on a collision course for another war. And then Jerusalem Post has put out a very detailed article also

saying we may need to act again. A senior IOF official warns of a renewed Iranian threat, and in within that article they actually mention a statement recently made by a former IRGC commander, Mohsen Rezaei, who warned that Iran would enter a war with the United States if Israel carried out another attack against it and said Tehran would not accept negotiations with Western countries. That would give Israel time to prepare or to strengthen its

position. He struck A darker tone in his remarks, saying that if the war lasts 2 months today, there would be nothing left of Israel. The Israelis want to try their military luck against Iran again. If this happens, we will use all our forces. We will change our red lines and things will happen that are not right for me to say now. So Iran is very clearly

responding to what is happening. And of course, part of what is happening is again, just as they're doing with Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Palestine and the Iraqi resistance non state actors trying also to disarm them. They're using the snapback mechanism that has been imposed now or reinstated by the United Nations at the behest of the UK, Germany and France. If we can just move the slide on again within. No, sorry, back to the Wynette one. Well, thank you.

So Wynette reported that Israel remained on heightened alert after the UN reinstated sanctions. And so clearly the sanctions which restore an arms embargo, restriction on uranium enrichment and ballistic missile activity, asset freezes and travel bans. This again is, is totally unjustified.

And yet what it's doing, of course, in in public perception, those that are not well informed on what has actually been going on with the nuclear negotiations for some time, of course Trump pulled out of them in 2018. It, it, it portrays Iran as the belligerent, as I said, in preparation for an escalation and aggression against them. And if we look at again, back to Hagseth, who did an interview again in the Jerusalem first post, we're fighting the same War on Terror.

This is a conversation with Pete Hagseth. And within that interview he basically reiterates that he sees A1 state solution, which of course will be the one state of Israel, not of Palestine. He even rejects the two state solution, which of course we know is is not viable anyway. And he talks about war with Iran and and he brings in the biblical context for war with Iran. As I said, Christian Zionism on full display.

And then this is a very good account on Telegram that I recommend everybody following Enemy Watch who does an excellent job of of keeping up with events in West Asia. In particular, they've been putting out information about planned attacks on Iran, Iraq and Yemen. Aerial refuelling tankers are on route to the Middle East.

An estimated 12 US Air Force KC135 Strata tankers transferred from US to EU bases and then also also the RA FRC135 W sorry joint electronic intelligence aircraft that are flying to the Qatari air base. From within Britain and there are multiple reports really of other movements of particularly aircraft to the Middle East area. Iran itself also has been running tests on missiles. Drones have been spotted over the western border of Iran

patrolling and surveilling. And they've also put out another statement which said that they're not going to any longer stick to the restrictions on their missile range. In other words, this is a direct threat to the European Union that they will no longer only consider Israel as their target.

And then finally, the US has been supplying further for further third air defence systems to reinforce the six existing systems in Israel. Of course, one of the problems in the last Iran, Israel war was that Israel was effectively starting to run out of interceptor munitions. And so therefore the US is clearly trying to reinforce their ability to intercept missiles coming in from Iran.

In my opinion, speaking to particularly Iranians who are currently here in Lebanon that I've had the opportunity to to speak to, they're effectively saying that Iran in the last war didn't even use its most advanced missiles.

And therefore, in their opinion, the third interceptors are not really going to be still capable of intercepting the more advanced missiles from Iran. But you know, the chatter here in Lebanon, the chatter in Syria is that the region is about to go boom, as someone said to me this morning from inside Syria. And, and certainly that's where we seem to be heading.

And we can't also forget when we talk about the biblical context, the the Christian Zionist end time ideology, which of course requires effectively apocalyptic war in order to bring about the second coming of Christ. Now, many of us may consider that to be an extreme narrative, but nevertheless, that is how these people think. It's how Pete Hagseth thinks. Many articles have been written about his Christian Zionist extremism, so we should expect the worst to be honest.

Indeed, Vanessa, thank you very much. And and just on that to to consider what Hexis said, where the UK appears to be now and you know the comment about the region going boom. Do you think there will be or there is intent for in the first instance, the Americans and the British to get involved in in an on the ground context? No, I don't think so. Israel potentially will get involved on the ground in Lebanon, not in Yemen or Iran at

the moment. They'll probably try to trigger internal reactions within Iran against the government and in Syria. They'll weaponize the Takfiri elements against Iraq and Lebanon potentially. OK, OK, Vanessa, thank you very much indeed. And we'll don't just return to that in extra.

Now working on the premise that there's no such thing as coincidence, we'll review the communications from the embassy, British Embassy in Mogadishu who've recently put out a statement saying that the United Kingdom is contributing over £30 million to support Somalia's security transition. Now, of course, this is not a a new thing.

The United Kingdom, in all sorts of guises, has been very much involved with affairs Somali. But it is interesting to note, as reported by TRT Africa, that Somalia is just about to begin drilling for its own oil in the coming months. We see the Somali president just coming up off ship, presumably investigating where this offshore is. It's reckoned to be an enormous resource.

And the point to note on this is how it pertains to Turkey, because the interested party, the company that's going to be doing the drilling, is Turkish. And there's an article here that I've got a note for, sorry, a link to in the show notes on the Geopolitics Unplugged Substack talking about how Turkey has turned Russian sanctions to its advantage largely due to its strategic geostrategic position in relation to its geography.

But of course, what mustn't be forgotten in all of this is the United Kingdom's murky dealings with regard to particular Somaliland and the recognition of sovereignty by Ethiopia, which granted access to the port of Berbra by the Berbra

corridor. Now, this might sound completely unrelated to anything that you're necessarily concerned with, but in actual fact, the Port of Berbra is run by the UAE company DP World, which of course was partly funded by the British taxpayer through British International Investment. And we see here that they are of course involved in London. This was reported on by Ben Rubin a number of weeks ago.

The Thames Freeport of course, described as being something that might seem like it's being run by government, but actually it's not. It's owned by DP World out of UAE and and indeed it's something that we will keep a very close eye on. But this this would appear to relate directly back to the UK stirring up tensions in Somalia in order to ensure that its grip control and indeed the outcomes in the Horn of Africa are to its advantage.

So again, we'll keep our eyes on that and how it pertains to things that happened back in this country with the example of the the terms Freeport. Now that takes us back to Vanessa, who has an update on what TikTok have been up to. Yeah, well, actually it's it's a lot to do with the Israeli dominance of the media and information sphere. So this was a meeting that Netanyahu had in while he was in New York with pro Israeli influencers. So let's just have a listen to what he said.

Christian influencers, OK, you said you talked about the walk right? And he said, I call it the walk right. That's a brilliant the walk right? Because these people, you know, they're not any different from the walk left. I mean, they're, they're insane, they're noisy, but they're actually meeting on some of the things. And what we have to do is we have to secure that part of our the base of our support in the United States that is being

challenged systematically. A lot of this is done with money, money of NGOs, vast money of governments faster. OK, we have to fight back. How do we fight back our influencers? I think you should also talk to them if you have a chance to that, that community, they're very important. And secondly, we're going to have to use the tools of battle. You know, the the weapons change over time. You can't fight today with the swords. That doesn't work very well.

So quite extraordinary here and and then in the last 48 hours, articles have been all over the media talking about Israel is paying these influences 7000 per post, $7000 per post. Just let that sink in. Netanyahu referred this week to a community pushing out preferred messaging in the US media and boy, are they making a princely sum. So let's look at a little more little more detail on on this

whole complex. Bridge Partners, a firm working for the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, sent a series of invoices for its influencer campaign to have U.S. Media Group in Germany, an international Media Group working for Israel. The invoices detailed a sum of 900,000 starting in June and slated to end in November for a cohort of 14 to 18 influencers to create content.

So They are Told, goes on to break down the costs and to work out that each content creator is receiving 7000 per post. Then if we look in towards the end of September, there was an article in Politico talking about a democratic mega firm. SKDK drops Israel as its client. Now bear in mind, that's democratic. That's that's the Democrat

aligned organization. So it's it's bipartisan, this support of Israel. Again, I want to make this very clear, because people tend to become very partisan over these issues and it's bipartisan, the support of Israel. So again, in Politico, they basically say SKDK has worked for several pro Israel efforts over the years, but this was the first time it represented the Israeli government itself.

It collaborated with Havas, a European advertising and PR firm, on behalf of Lapan, the Israeli government advertising agency, with the ultimate client being the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Now another article appeared at the same time in an in an independent media outlet called rather interesting, the Sludge. And they talk about SDK Knickerbocker. That was its former name. I did check that. That's that's not parody, it's

now just simply called SKDKA. Top Democrat Party aligned public relations firm had agreed to run a bot paste programme to amplify pro Israel narratives on Instagram, Tiktok, LinkedIn, YouTube and other platforms, according to a filing under the Foreign Agents Registration Act submitted on August the 29th.

The contract, which was signed on April the 28th 2025, describes a strategy to flood the zone with contact promoting the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs pro Israel messages using automated tools to increase the reach and visibility of specific pro. So this is an entire industrial complex working to whitewash the genocide in Palestine and to push forward pro Israeli narratives across all social

media platforms. And then if we also look, they go on to say that who else receives these messages? So the contract for SDSKDK was worth 600,000 and it's coaching Israeli civil society spokespeople for on camera appearances, testing the effectiveness of social media influences and arranging tailored outreach to journalists at outlets including BBCCNN, Fox, Associated Press to secure favourable coverage. Exactly.

Of course what we saw in Syria with the media complex that was created to provide witnesses and testimonials to the likes of the BBC and CNN to run anti government narratives inside Syria. Now this com, this following article came from back in March and this is where it gets interesting. So Facebook paid a GOP firm to malign Tiktok. So why has Israel been able to

take over Tiktok? Because of course, Tiktok has been much maligned generally as being a Chinese influencer, which in my opinion has effectively enabled Israel to step into the bridge and take control of TikTok itself. And then, but this is also interesting.

So according to Sludge, according to the filing, SK D's work for Israel, overseen by its parent company Stagwell Global, is being done as a subcontractor for the French public relations firm Havas. Stagwell, founded by long time Likud Ali Mach pen, also has a Republican Party aligned affiliate called Targeted Victory that is working as a subcontractor for Havas on Pro Israel communications.

And it's targeted Victory that was basically demonizing TikTok on behalf of Israel to enable the buy out of TikTok. So as I said this, this is a bipartisan Republican, Democrat policy to support Israel and enable Israel to infiltrate all social media platforms, particularly, of course, in the US. But I would guess there's also similar operations ongoing in the UK.

And if we move on to something else that Netanyahu makes very clear in his conversation with his pet influencers, he's not only going to buy out TikTok, he's also targeting X and Elon Musk. So let's just play this. Most important purchase that is going on right now is class TikTok, TikTok number one, number one, and I hope it goes through because it's it can be consequential. And the other one, what's the other one that's most important? X? Thanks.

We should be extremely concerned about this because Israel is effectively taking over every single social media platform and will eventually also be taking over all the platforms that are used to to give a voice to independent media. Yeah, very good point, well made, Vanessa. And of course, again, the vast majority of the public who do have access to this information and it gets pushed out have absolutely no idea how it's coming to them or why.

So a real danger, which again, I hope we'll have time to talk about in extra. Now, I'm pleased to say that we're going to bring Diane back into the program because she has got an update on some of the very high quality written material that's gone out on the UK column website recently. Diane. Yes, thanks Charles. I, I just wanted to give today an update on some of the written content that we've been publishing the last couple of

months here at UK column. As the commissioning editor for written content, I want to point out especially to viewers that these articles are very in depth, very well researched pieces of journalism. And we don't have time to go into the depth that we on the news that we do in these articles. And so we spend a great deal of time working with authors and I'm working on editing and, and presenting detailed information to people as much as possible.

So if you feel like you're not getting enough depth from our new segments, which are still quite deep, please check out some of these reading articles. And I'm just going to highlight a few things that have been going out the past few months. The first one that I want to show here is from Mark Anderson, who's one of our presenters on Friday.

This came out a little over a month ago, but I think it's important to look at again, the UN at 80 and other key topics highlighted at Tulsa's Red Pill Expo. So this is something that happens in the States and he covers this every year. So going back to look at the history of the UN and, and, and how this has sort of impacted us over time was of course of extreme importance to all of us.

The next thing that I want to highlight here is another one of our frequent authors, Hugh McCarthy, who is a retired head teacher in Northern Ireland. He's doing a multiple part series on the effects of the COVID lockdowns on children and Part 1 has been published. Lest lest we forget they knew they did it anyway and there will be more to come from Hugh as we go forward. The next part is a two-part series from Professor David Miller, who also is a frequent

author for you could call him. This is a very interesting and and rather alarming couple of articles.

This first one is called How the British intelligence network of astroturf Muslim civil society groups is kept Secret and Deniable. And this is again part of the two-part series which basically looks at in both parts how the government has been the business of developing as he calls it, a vast network of deniable front groups in the Muslim community, including leaked documents that have been linked to MIT press.

And they show exactly how the network was set up and the agreements between British intelligence agencies and the basically the relationships between these organizations and what the government has been doing behind the scenes using these propaganda techniques. And Part 2 of that was just published a few days ago. And we also have a multiple part series from Professor Gloria Moss. Part 1 on post Truth was published a few weeks ago.

Actually, this was earlier in the summer on ubiquity of post truth and how this has infiltrated society in general. And this is part of a three-part series. So again, going into that that theme again of the the very deep journalism reporting that our authors do. Part 2 was just published a few days ago about post Truth in education. And we will have Part 3 of Post Truth from from Professor Moss coming out shortly.

Another one that I want to highlight here is from Professor David Miller and a new author to UK column Jill Thompson, who was with N position called Scottish Sport Palestine.

This is a two-part series of Part 1 was published just recently, this week actually, and it's called the day that Celtic Football club played to raise money for land theft in Palestine. And so there are some some very undeniable links here between Celtic and, and, and kind of what's going on with all of the things around Zionism and song that we have been discussing throughout the news and continue

to cover on UK column. And this is very well timed for some things that are about to come out shortly. So we will be continuing to visit this and Part 2 will be released in due course when it is appropriate. But I also want to highlight a couple of different series of of of things that we have been covering over time at UK column. And these have sort of smaller sites within our websites. You can look at all of the coverage that we have on these

topics in certain places. The first one that I want to mention is for not the residential school, which happens to be something that I've been working on as well as Brian Garrish and others for almost a number of years now

actually. So this is all within a sort of the mini site on the website and this is a particular interest currently because there is a child going on right now in the High Court in Glasgow. The 77 year old Patricia Robertson is currently facing a total of 25 charges of abuse which is said to have occurred at Fernethi Residential School in Angus between 1967 and 1983. Keeping in mind of course that Fernethi Residential School was open between 1960 and 1991.

And these allegations are part of a series of testimonies that are going on right now, as I said in the High Court in Glasgow. And this includes all, all types of violence that we can possibly imagine, unfortunately to these these women who were little girls at the time. And we will continue to have ongoing coverage, deep coverage of this case and the petition around their their fight for justice and all of the things that the Finetti ladies have

been facing for, for many years. And finally, I'd like to end with us the highlight of a series page that we have now called Serious Centric Regional Analysis. And I'm happy to say that actually today's the first day I've ever been on the news with Vanessa Beeley. And a lot of this has to do of course with her reporting in Syria. So Vanessa, I don't know if you wanted to say anything about these really amazing and in depth articles that you and your colleagues have been working on.

No, I just think if people do want, as you said, a far more contextual in depth analysis of what is happening not only in Syria but in the region and all the complexities explained, then please do go to Syria centric because we'll be trying to bring out something on a weekly basis there. Super Vanessa, thank you and indeed Diane, thank you very

much. It is a really good point to make that whilst we do go into as much depth as we can in the news programme, we are of course limited on time and therefore the website is the place to go for a really detailed look at many of the big issues out there. Now just to round up the programme, I'm just going to take us back to a theme that Sandy Adams was developing on Monday, which is the sort of constant assault that farmers

and land owners are under. And the most least most recent ash comes from Natural England who have just put out their Nature returns summary report. And in essence they're talking about tackling the twin challenges of climate change and biodiversity loss. But of course what they fail to mention is that much of the so-called biodiversity loss is because of the very farming practices that the government

has sponsored via subsidy. A lot of the answer has been put forward in a report by somebody called Dan Corry in April 2025, which is essentially A regulatory reform paper and it was described as being an independent report. And I think this is the point I want to make. He has just been appointed as a non executive board member at Defra and there is really nothing independent about him at

all. Between the years of 2007 and 2010, he was the he was the head of economic policy at #10 Downing St. and therefore is not an outsider even remotely. The other point to make is that he is also the chief economist at the Future Governance Forum, and that is a think tank that was set up in 2023 with the very idea of completely overturning the system. So it's not at all coincident that his regulatory reform would have net zero.

Of course, at its core, and by omission, it's very important to point out that there are absolutely no references to farming being part of the way to regenerate landscape and indeed improve the environment. With the situation. Soil gets improved, human health gets improved, and indeed it makes goodness good business sense for all. But I'm happy to say that I attended an event in Edinburgh

on and Diane was there also. If you don't believe me, there's a picture on screen that more or less proves it. But I'm just going to ask Diane now to just give a couple of remarks about the success of that event and how it flies in the face of what we're told by by Natural England. Yeah, thanks, Charles. It was really a. Great event, very well. Attended, very good comments,

really good vibe. I felt like a very good energy there and it was called the Food and Health Festival we've been mentioning on the news for the past few weeks. And thank you to all of the UK column members who came out to see Charles and I away up in Edinburgh, up in the north. It was really, really useful to hear from some of the local farmers and natural health practitioners and other types of vendors to hear them say, you know, what they are doing actually truly protecting the land.

Some in some cases working off grid, as I know you do, Charles, really supporting the, the true nature of what we should be doing when we're talking about actually supporting the environment, providing good food and and supporting the health of the people of this country, which sometimes it seems like the government is not necessarily on side with us on that, on that issue. But it was really good to hear

from all of them. I and your your talk, particularly Charles, was, I thought very interesting because it did help people position the individual things that these farmers are doing that they were telling us about all day in their talks. And then for you to be able to put that in that larger context as well as someone who does it as a smallholder, Charles, I thought was really particularly useful. Lovely.

Thank you very much, Diane. Yeah, it was a very positive day and I. Think the main thing to come. Out of it is that what was being discussed was not conceptual. This was for these were voices of experience, people who are actually doing something and can demonstrate by scientific rigour that they are improving the quality of soil, the quality of their livestock and all the rest of it.

So it's very positive and I hope would serve as an inspiration to you to get involved in, you know, taking control of your, of your own food supply. And I'm sorry we've run a little bit over, but that does bring us to the end of the programme. So Vanessa and Diane, thank you very much indeed for joining me. Please remember my words about joining us for the live stream in York and indeed all the benefits that are associated with that. Go to the shop on the website to

look at further details. And indeed, Please remember the discussion that I'll be having with Brian Gerrish at 1:00 tomorrow afternoon on the subject of conscription and recruitment into the armed forces. And that's it from us today, but please join us again at 1:00 on Friday. Goodbye.