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So, welcome to The Restless Politics's leading with me, Alistair Campbell, a knee-roarie steward.

And today we're joined by Baroness Saida Vasi. And though this is very much a leading interview,

we also do see it as part of the debate that we've been having about the dreadful events in

the Middle East. And we're trying to give a balanced assessment, provide a platform to people

that we believe have got something interesting and worthwhile to say about what's happening,

but also to try and help educate and form and debate within the framework of our motto,

disagreeing agreeably. So Saida, born in Yorkshire, to Pakistani parents, a lawyer,

then a member of the cabinet when Rory was a rising star on the Tory backbenches. Indeed,

when she and I co-presented a Channel 4 programme, made me Prime Minister last year,

she confessed to me that she'd wanted Rory to beat Boris Johnson, so a woman of sound judgment.

She was the first Muslim member of the British cabinet under David Cameron. She was the first

woman to chair the Tory party, but she resigned from the government in 2014 over their handling of

a previous crisis involving Israel and Gaza. And she said this, support for Israel's attacks and

official language surrounding the crisis in Gaza was morally indefensible, not in Britain's

national interest, and will have a long-term detrimental impact on our reputation internationally

and domestically. So what about now, almost a decade on when the death toll is already even higher?

In recent days, she's been expressing similar concerns at the horror of what was inflicted by

Hamas on October 7, and the support offered by world leaders to Israel is being taken by Israeli

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as a green light to commit atrocities himself. She fears that

...