Enda Brady: UK correspondent on Keir Starmer chairing an emergency meeting to discuss Israel-Iran conflict

Prime Minister  Sir Keir Starmer recently chaired a meeting to discuss the  UK’s response to the crisis in the Middle East.

There's growing concerns the conflict could escalate further, should the US enter the conflict between Israel and Iran.

UK correspondent Enda Brady says the UK Government will be weighing up a series of options, as the US hasn't revealed what actions they plan to take.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
And in the Brady is our UK correspondent. Heyinda, Hey, Heather, Great,

(00:04):
what's this emergency meeting about? Ree Israel?

Speaker 2 (00:09):
So Keir Starmer is weighing up his options, really, and
he likes to be organized. So I think what he's
expecting is a phone call from Donald Trump asking permission
to use a joint UK US air base in the
Chagos Islands called Diego Garcia. That is where the biggest
aircraft the United States have will take off from. And

(00:30):
if they are going to use a bunker buster bomb
to wipe out these nuclear facilities that the Iranians have
in a place called four Doh, that's where the aircraft
will have to take off from. So Starmer is getting
organized out of the blue. He called this emergency meeting
yesterday afternoon, a couple of hours long. They call it COBRA.
Normally it means there's like a domestic threat or incident

(00:53):
and they go into it. All sounds very dramatic, cobra
Cabinet office, briefing room. Hey, that's how Anna Dyne it
actually is. So Starmer went in there and he had
his defense and security people with him. They're weighing up options,
and I guess as well. You know, there could also
be the feasibility of perhaps the Americans asking for refueling

(01:15):
options at RAF at Criterion Cyprus. So he's quite adamant.
I think that the Americans are going to get involved
and they may ask for some British support.

Speaker 1 (01:26):
Well yeah, so if you believe the Wall Street Journal,
and I have no reason not to, then Donald Trump
has already approved the plan. It just needs his final
go ahead, in which case is Starma just doing this
on the in case or are they actually getting all
the ducks in a row and then they're going to
pull pen.

Speaker 2 (01:43):
Now, I think Starmer hasn't been told anything in advance.
That much was clear. They went to the G seven,
and everything that has happened subsequently I think has blindsided Europe.
So all of the people I've spoken to this week
on my TV show, no European leaders were informed whatsoever.
They've been completely taken out of the loop. And everything

(02:04):
that's happening with Israel and America, nobody in Europe has
a heads up. So Starmer, as much as he's probably
the only person in Europe that has any influence or
the Trump would even listen to Starmer, knew nothing.

Speaker 1 (02:20):
Why has Europe been taken out of the loop.

Speaker 2 (02:23):
I think in recent weeks the relationship with Israel, certainly
in the UK, has deteriorated. Starmer decided to sanction two
very senior Israeli ministers over appalling comments they made about
the people in Gaza. So Smodrich and Ben Gevere have
been sanctioned by the UK government. That did not go
down well in Tel Aviv, did not go down well

(02:46):
with net and Yahoo. And you know, the people were
saying that the UK is now anti Semitic, you know,
the usual rhetoric we get from Israel every single time
something happens that they don't like. Starmer, it took him
a long long time to sanctioned these two guys, but
he did it, and I think that has really upset
the Israeli government. So, you know, the UK has backed

(03:09):
Israel to the hilt for decades, and now it's no
longer considered to be a reliable ally.

Speaker 1 (03:16):
Okay, interesting, Hey, this body that's been found in the
London explosion. Hell is a body in the London explosion
also stabbed. This looks Dodgies all hell, doesn't it?

Speaker 2 (03:27):
Yes, it does. And a man in his forties has
now been arrested on suspicion of murder. So the emergency
services turned up to what they thought was simply a
terrible gas explosion. They went into the rubble and they
found the body of a woman in her forties, a
married woman with children in her forties. Closer inspection of

(03:48):
that body and they realized that it was not as
straightforward as what they initially turned up to, expecting she
had been stabbed, and they really appalling irony and all
of this. It's such a tragedy. The lady had been
working helping women who are victims of domestic violence, and
it would now appear that the man arrested was known
to her and that she herself has become a victim

(04:11):
of domestic violence.

Speaker 1 (04:12):
Jesus, that's pretty said Inda. Thank you, I really appreciate
your time, mate. Look after yourself. Enjoy that heat in
the Brady UK correspondence suffering through difficult temperatures in the
UK like twenty six degrees.

Speaker 2 (04:24):
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