You're listening to a podcast from the BBC World Service. This is Hard Talk with me, Stephen Sacker.

Thanks for downloading this edition of the program. I do hope you enjoy it.

Welcome to Hard Talk on the BBC World Service, with me, Stephen Saka. Viewed from the

outside, there is a familiarity and circularity to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,

which leaves the impression that the current grim dynamic is immutable, but there just might be

factors at play right now which could unsettle the status quo.

Gaza this year has seen unprecedented popular protests aimed at the ruling Hamas Islamist

movement for its failure to alleviate economic suffering. The leader of the Palestinian authority

in the West Bank, Mahmoud Abbas, is aging and his authority is waning. Meanwhile, in Washington,

the Trump administration, no longer seen as an honest broker

by the Palestinians, but nonetheless still central to the region's diplomacy, is preparing to launch

a comprehensive peace plan based on economic rather than political foundations. My guest today,

on the line from Gaza, is Hamas spokesman Ghazi Hamad.

While his movement's rhetoric is unbending, do the Palestinian people long for fresh ideas?

Well, Ghazi Hamad in Gaza, welcome to hard talk. Thank you very much.

Let me ask you a simple question. When the people of Gaza ask you how you and the

Hamas movement are going to make their lives better, what do you say? I think we are struggling.

We are working day and night in order to ease the life of people in Gaza here.

But I think people, they understand very well that the reason of this crisis is occupation, is the

policy of the siege, is the policy of the blockade, is the pressure on Gaza every day.

Because Israel looked at Gaza as a hostile region and they try to keep Gaza under siege,

blockade sanctions and striking every day. I think we are trying to stop this. I think we

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