hours ago. you can see large explosions lighting up the night sky. be hamas run health ministry in gaza says more than 9400 people have been killed in the territory. hamas is classed as a terrorist organisation by several western government. member, diplomatic efforts aimed at assisting palestinian civilians continue. arab foreign minister told us secretary of state antony blinken that there must be an immediately ceasefire in gaza. israel insists they will be no temporary truce until all hostages have been released. we start our coverage with a report from our reporterjon donnison and we warn there are distressing images from the start. four weeks into this war, the suffering is endless. and in gaza, no place is safe. the un says this school in jabalia in the north was hit this morning, killing at least 15 people. thousands had been seeking shelter there. "god will take my vengeance," this young boy says. "i was standing here when the three bombings happened." "where should i go?" he says. "they have hit the shelters. "since when has it become normal "to strike "shelters?" israel says it's looking into what happened. and in the north of gaza, its ground offensive is pushing forward, tightening its grip on hamas, who israel says is using civilians as human shields. hamas is outgunned, but these pictures from its military wing claim to show it fighting back. since the ground offensive began, as the number of palestinian casualties continues to rise. the us secretary of state met with arab leaders in jordan this afternoon. antony blinken again asserted israel's right to defend itself. but... protecting civilians will help prevent hamas from further exploiting the situation. but most important, it is simply the right and moral thing to do. when i see... ..a palestinian boy or girl pulled from the wreckage of a building, it hits me in the gut just as it hits everyone in the gut. and i see my own children in theirfaces. and america is also worried about this conflict spreading. israel's military has said it targeted a terrorist trying to cross over from lebanon on its northern border last night. less than a mile away in the town of shlomi, volunteers have been preparing food for israeli soldiers amid fears the powerful lebanese militia group hezbollah could escalate this crisis. very serious, very sad. we cry at night. i don't sleep at night. i watch tv all night. we watched all the terrible cases, everything that's happened. we run. when there's a siren, we run. and when we can, we work. and yes, we are under danger. we're risking our lives. there has been so much fear and grief over the last four weeks. and it's farfrom over. jon donnison, bbc news, jerusalem. a little earlier, i spoke with our diplomatic correspondent paul adams about mr blink and's diplomatic efforts. paul, thanks so much for being with us. us secretary of state... a variety of torque. what would you say came out of his visit? it is a broad agenda he has tried to make sure that the conflict does not escalate and spread beyond gaza, trying to secure the release of hostages including us citizens but also i think crucially trying to alleviate the situation on the ground in southern gaza, where the population has been swallowed by the arrival of as many of i swallowed by the arrival of as many ofi million people who have fled from fighting further north. the americans believe they are making progress. they say the number of trucks that are crossing the rafah crossing from egypt into the gaza strip �*s has increased around 100 today and they wanted to increase to several hundred. they also believe that a mechanism is now in place agreed by the israelis to let fuel in, to keep hospitals going and to keep the whole humanitarian aid relief effort going, when that fuel finally runs out. that is quite a key development because the israelis have been refusing any entry of fuel until now. joe biden asked also about whether or not there was progress on creating these humanitarian pauses, said, yes, there was progress and gave a thumbs up sign. this is not a ceasefire, these are little windows of opportunity, where the fighting might be reduced or suspended for a matter of hours in a very particular location again to allow the aid, humanitarian effort to really address the growing needs of the population in southern gaza. i should add that none of that changes the reality in the northern part of the gaza strip, that is now completely cut off by the israeli. it is the scene of intense street fighting and the three 300— 400 civilians in that area are now effectively on their own.— that area are now effectively on their own. talking about the fiuuhtin , on their own. talking about the fighting. as _ on their own. talking about the fighting. as you _ on their own. talking about the fighting, as you alluding - on their own. talking about the fighting, as you alluding to - fighting, as you alluding to there, that going on is the diplomacy does at the same time. what more can you tell us about that operation from idf forces in the gaza strip? the? forces in the gaza strip? they have been _ forces in the gaza strip? they have been pushing _ forces in the gaza strip? they have been pushing closer- forces in the gaza strip? tie: have been pushing closer and closer to gaza city. the main built—up area in the north consists of gaza city, a couple of refugee camps and some surrounding areas. that is the focus of the israeli army's evident at the moment. they believe that is a hamas stronghold and they are in cycling that from all directions and pressing in very, very close to heavily populated areas. we are seeing air strikes and sometimes artillery strikes that are having a terrifying effect on the civilians to remain in that area and that may indeed be part of the israeli strategy, because they want all of those civilians out of that area while they conduct their military operation against a must make. the presence of so many civilians is clearly an enormous complication that is why we are seeing from time to time sometimes more than ones or twice a day, scenes of civilians being caught up and killed in these military operations. israelis really want to try to force people out. they are saying they will keep the road open to the southern gaza strip for a few hours again tomorrow in the hope that people heed their warnings and get out while they still can. �* ., ., ,., still can. and on that point, with regards _ still can. and on that point, with regards to _ still can. and on that point, with regards to the - still can. and on that point, | with regards to the civilians, do we have any clear idea when civilians, those injured and foreign nationals, might be able to get out of the rafah crossing wants again. ——? that's an ongoing effort had wondered a lot of governments are involved with including the americans and the british and others. it all got suspended and stuck today. it is not entirely clear why. it may be because hamas were trying to evacuate people in ambulances and were preventing civilians from leaving while they were still trying to get that done. we do not know who they were trying to evacuate. was at some of their own injured people? we just don't know but for 1's reason or another it seems very few if any people crossed at all today. the british are saying they are disappointed by that. they had hoped that several dozen british nationals might be able to get out. but their efforts are continuing to get that crossing open. there are hundreds, in fact several thousand, foreign nationals from more than 40 countries still waiting to get out and there are very concerted international efforts to try and keep that crossing at rubber open. i expect we will see it open again maybe tomorrow and that the process of gradual evacuation will continue on and off for days to come. —— rafah crossing thank you for your reporting. find come. -- rafah crossing thank you for your reporting.- you for your reporting. and a short while — you for your reporting. and a short while ago _ you for your reporting. and a short while ago i _ you for your reporting. and a short while ago i spoke - you for your reporting. and a | short while ago i spoke about security blink and's visit with john altmann, he is now serving as a director of the middle east programme. that's at the centre for strategic and international studies. i want to begin with what we have seen from president biden. he was asked about a humanitarian pause. he gave a thumbs up. do you think that we could potentially see humanitarian pauses for civilians in gaza anytime soon? i think we'll see some sort of a pause. with all these israeli hostilities with hamas, there is often something short of a ceasefire but with some sort of delimiting of free passage for people, of an ability to get relief in, i think we will see something but it is much less than the arab governments were asking for today. i think it is likely to be much less than the us government was asking the israelis for. that's interesting. much less than you think the administration was asking the israelis for. is there any gap there between the two? do you think their positions are widening? what kind of conversations do you think are happening behind closed doors right now? there has been a widening gap in the last several weeks. the us really sees the last two decades as a time where it has gained a lot of experience fighting insurgencies. we fight insurgencies in afghanistan and iraq and against isis in western iraq and syria, and there is really a set of principles about how you do that, how you split the population away from the combatants. how you think about — how you fight shapes what you are trying — what you're trying to do at the end shapes the way fight. i think the israelis don't think that counterinsurgency is applicable in this situation. they have been dealing with hostility from palestinians for more than a century and think they don't need lessons from anybody. it seems to me there are a lot of signs that the americans think, actually we do have something to say that will be helpful, that will get you out of this endless loop. and the israelis say, let us handle this. so far, it is being inaudible but i think those differences are growing. the argument from the israeli government is that a full ceasefire, which is of course a greater undertaking than a humanitarian pause, would essentially allow for hamas to regroup and that is something the us secretary of state anthony blinken repeated on his trip as well to the region. what you make that? there is also the issue of where does the freeing of more than 200 hostages fit into this. i think there is a reasonable case to be made that hamas asking for a ceasefire now rather than making concessions and releasing hostages, i think you can make an argument that this is something that we should negotiate and hamas does not want to negotiate it. but what we're seeing is, i think we're going to see an increasing number of palestinian casualties, we're going to see an increasing number of images of palestinian casualties and there is increasing pressure on israel for the government to release all these — work to release all these hostages at whatever cost. how that plays out in palestinian politics and israeli politics, we will have to see. another development we have seen today, turkey recalling its israel ambassador, cutting talks with prime minister netanyahu, who over that refusal to agree to a ceasefire. do think this could be symbolic or indicative of widening fissures there as well between arab states, the united states and what this could mean for further down the line? turkey of course is not an arab state and president erdogan said last week that hamas is a terrorist or freedom fighters, it is mujahideen. cast its ballot a week ago not with the withdrawal of the ambassador. it does seem to me that from the american point of view, and you have seen secretary blinken advancing this, there is going to have to be an arab role in securing and legitimising a settlement after hamas's is pushed from power. the secretary of state is very eager to bring arabs in. the israelis seems much less interest in it and the arabs are appreciably saying this israeli behaviour is precisely what will get us uninterested in playing any role here and the gap seems to me to be widening rather than narrowing, which is what the us is trying to do. returning to gaza now where the hamas run health ministry has accused israel of carrying out another deadly air strike. now quoted by the afp news agency, it alleges that the strike on the refugee camp in central gaza killed over 30 people. israel says it is looking into the incident. we are getting information from inside gaza, which is difficult but our correspondent remains there, and he sent us this update earlier. today, israel opened the salah al—din road, the axis in and out of gaza for the first time since a couple of days since they started the operation, ground operation in gaza. very few people managed to get out of gaza because the main road was damaged and access for car was almost impossible. but in gaza city, people are starting to flee the heavy fighting around the city. as the israeli ground operation expanded around gaza city from three different directions. the tanks were advancing near gaza city itself, especially the western part of gaza. tonight, again, the israeli air strikes were intensified around the al-quds hospital and also around the shifa hospital, where many solar panels on the roof of the building around the hospital were targeted from the air. we feel that israel is pushing the civilian population. they are taking the hospital as shelter to flee this place. they bombed, tonight, the largest bakery in the place that is feeding most of the bread to the neighbourhood near the shifa hospital, also in the north of gaza strip, fighting was intensified in the north—west part near the coastal road, where the hamas militants group saying that they have fired anti—tank missiles and they were engaged in gun battle with the israeli soldiers who are advancing towards the gaza city. here, in khan younis, where about a million people displaced from their houses in gaza city and the north, they live in a very difficult situation with the severe shortage of electricity, food and water. journalists like rushdie, who are reporting on the ground in gaza are doing so at enormous personal risk, and 36 journalists have been killed since a mass �*s attack on october seven, and israel's air 0ctober seven, and israel's air strikes against gaza began. 31 of them were palestinian, four were israeli and one was lebanese. the israel defense forces has said it cannot guarantee the safety of journalists operating in gaza, and for more on the situation forjournalists on the ground, i've been speaking to the president of the committee to protect journalists, jodie ginsberg. jodie, thank you so much for being with us. just to begin with, sketch out the level of danger forjournalists operating in gaza right now. the level of danger forjournalists operating in gaza right now is absolutely unprecedented. this is the most dangerous conflict for journalists that the committee to protectjournalists has ever documented, and we have been recording and documenting attacks against journalists for more than 30 years. 36journalists have been killed in the past four weeks, and to put that into a kind of context for you — last year, we documented 68 journalists and media workers killed worldwide over the space of 12 months, and 36 have died just in four weeks, just in israel and gaza. jodie, why do you think so many of them have been killed? no international crews are able to get into gaza. the only people able to report from gaza are gazan journalists and there is literally nowhere in gaza currently that is safe. we have seen hospitals bombed, we have seen schools under attack, and journalists are civilians, so they face the same risks that any civilian is currently risking, and they are also trying to document and cover what is going on, so they tend to be at places, like hospitals, where the injured are being brought and so on, or they tend to be filming convoys, and there is no where for them to be safe, like any civilian, in gaza at the moment. we have also seen a strike on a building used by afp in gaza. with strikes on infrastructure, how difficult does that also make continuing to do journalism, to get information out? it makes it extremely difficult. we have seen buildings that house media facilities have come under attack. we have seen obviously communications blackouts, as we saw last week, where it was impossible for any communication to get out, and that makes it extremely difficult. on top of that, of course, you have fuel shortages, food shortages, water shortages and that makes it, again, very difficult forjournalists to operate. they need to get about and it makes that extremely hard. what we have seen as well of course is this also means that journalists are losing their colleagues and i just wonder what the impact of that is as well. this must be incredibly traumatic. it is devastating. we have seen a number of colleagues, a number ofjournalists reporting live on air the deaths of their own colleagues. we have seen journalists reporting on the death of their own families. having to go into the hospital as journalists and their press insignia and report on the deaths of loved ones. incredibly traumatic. with all of this in mind, with this number ofjournalists killed in this conflict, what does this mean in terms of getting information to civilians in gaza and getting information out as well? it makes it extremely challenging. it is nevertheless absolutely vital. as i said, there are no international crews currently able to operate in gaza, so we are absolutely reliant on local palestinian journalists to document what is happening, to be our eyes and ears. it is extremely challenging, but they continue to do so, it is extremely challenging, that they continue to do so, they continue to report, because so many of them believe it is absolutely vital, their role is vital in this war to let people know what is happening outside of gaza. what needs to be done to protectjournalists? as i said, journalists are civilians so it is very important that they are treated as such, that we do not continue to see the kinds of indiscriminate bombings and attacks that have swept so many civilians up into this conflict. we know, from the united nations and others, that that is in breach of international humanitarian law and we need to see more vocal support for that globally. jodie ginsburg, president for the committee to protect journalists, thank you so much for being with us. we appreciate it. protests took place around the world on saturday, related to the israel gaza war. this was the israel gaza war. this was the scene injerusalem, as hundreds of people pushed through police barriers around the residence of israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu. protesters expressed anger over what they called the government's failure to prevent hamas's surprise attacks on the 7th of october. right here in washington, dc as well, thousands of people gathering at freedom plaza, that is a short walk from the white house, calling for a ceasefire in gaza, and our reporter is there. he has more details. this is one of the biggest pro—palestinian rallies in the history of washington, dc, possibly the biggest ever here. thousands are gathering, raising slogans, calling for freedom and justice for palestine and the palestinians, but they are also criticising the policy of the biden administration in this crisis, and in this war. of course, the biden administration has been trying to strike a balance between the us's unwavering support for israel, and calling for israel to follow international law, and consider the human lives, the lives of palestinian civilians in gaza. it remains to be seen how much this gathering and similar gatherings across the united states, which we have seen over the past three weeks, how much will that influence the policy of the us administration? ukraine's president has said it is taking away the focus from the conflict in his country. he said this was one of the goals of russia's invasion of ukraine. missed as's comments, as the un commission president ursula von der leyen made an unannounced visit to kyiv on saturday for talks on ukraine's efforts to join the european union. he hopes new leaders will open —— agreed to open formal session talks at the summit in november. it would require the unanimous votes of all nations, something that is not certain. coming out of the german news, police deal with a hostage situation in hamburg. hamburg airport. local media reporting that a man drove through a security barrier onto the tarmac with a child in his car. police think that the situation may be linked to a custody dispute. newer watching bbc news. remember of course you can always get the latest on our website. with all the latest on the situation is for israel and gaza. i am helena humphrey in washington. i will have more for you at the top of the hour. join me then if you can. goodbye for now. hello, there. the impacts from storm ciaran continue to be felt. now, on saturday across the uk, it was a day of sunshine and showers, or some longer spells of rain, for some of us, all driven in by an area of low pressure, but the low pressure has been named as a new storm that's going to be, again, bringing severe weather to europe. western france, gusts hitting 85mph, strong enough to blow over trees, so, again, there's going to be some transport disruption and also power cuts very likely here. all the while, 15—metre—high waves, that's as big as the waves could get, battering the coastline of portugal and north—west spain, and in italy, in tuscany, where we've seen severe flooding over recent days, this extra rain certainly isn't going to help things. the flooding could get worse before it gets better. now, over the next few hours for the uk, it's still quite unsettled. we've got rain, tending to ease to more showery conditions, across parts of northern england, something a bit drier for a time across the west, and temperatures around 3—7 celsius, as we head into the first part of sunday morning. so it will be a chilly start to the day. i think, through sunday morning, there will be further showers coming and going across eastern scotland, eastern england. otherwise, it's a fine and sunny and dry start to the day. however, into the afternoon we'll see showers build, particularly across western areas. but with the winds flowing in more from a west—north—westerly direction, that's crucial for those in southern england that have been affected by those really heavy showers and flooding. while those winds should push the showers offshore at last, so it should be a dry day in the far south. for those celebrating great great uncle guy's night, well, a few more showers coming and going, particularly across western areas, some clear spells and you'll need to wrap it warmly. it will be quite a chilly one. into monday's forecast, then, and things looking unsettled this time across the north and west of the uk, with some showers or longer spells of rain here. a few showers elsewhere across england and wales, but moving through fairly promptly, given the brisk westerly winds, and temperatures continue to run a little bit below average. now, deeper into the new week, we'll replace the mixture of sunshine and showers with more general outbreaks of rain, as we head in towards the middle part of the week. and of course, with the grounds completely saturated, following our prolonged spell of wet weather, we'll have to watch carefully to see if we see more flooding issues, as this band of rain works through. it does clear through and it will be followed again by a mixture of sunny spells and showery conditions towards the end of the week. bye for now. voiceover: this is bbc news. we'll have the headlines and all the main news stories for you at the top of the hour, straight after this programme. file: dozens of towns l and villages are flooded in ukraine after a major dam is breached. 0njune 6, 2023, the kakhovka dam, a critical infrastructure in the south of ukraine, was destroyed by an explosion. a huge reservoir of water on the dnipro river was unleashed downstream, with devastating consequences. we understand 16,000 residents on the banks of ukraine—controlled areas are in immediate, critical danger. shouts ukraine and nato accused russia of committing the act. the un warned of grave and far—reaching consequences, which are being felt across ukraine and beyond. this is the story of what happened after kakhovka.