song all day. we begin in egypt where officials insist traffic is flowing normally through the suez canal despite recent attacks further south in the red sea. iranian backed rebels in yemen have repeatedly targeted commercial vessels, leading some of the world s biggest shipping firms to suspend routes in the area. with more context, here s our business reporter david waddell. let us have a look at the situation. there are where the attacks occurred. at the northern end is the suez canal. you can t make your way unless you first pass this checkpoint. two companies. maersk, the container company and hapag lloyd another big shipping container company have both announced that they would not be making that passage. you have to pass the cape of good hope in south africa. that adds nearly 11,000 nautical miles to thejourney. adds nearly 11,000 nautical miles to the journey. there is another separate issue for the ships trying to traverse through the atlantic ocean and the pacific o
business reporter david waddell. let s have a look at the geography of the situation. right here is the bab al mandab strait. it s right next to yemen, from where those houthi attacks originated. it s at the southern end of the red sea. at the northern end is the suez canal. now, ships cannot pass through the suez canal from the south without first passing through this choke point. a couple of days ago, the maersk shipping container company and hapag lloyd both announced they wouldn t be making that transit. they ve since been joined by other shipping companies. now, if you re a ship master trying to get your vessel from the indian ocean to the atlantic ocean and you cannot or will not traverse through suez, you need to pass by the cape of good hope. that adds an extra 3,000 nautical miles to thejourney. and there are other issues for ships trying to traverse from the atlantic to the pacific ocean through here. the panama canal is accepting many fewer ships right now because
it s newsday. we begin in gaza, where in a sign of the growing hunger and desperation, crowds of people have scrambled for food from aid trucks entering the besieged strip, through the rafah crossing. for the first time since the war began, israel has also opened one of its crossings into gaza to aid. it s hoped the opening of the kerem shalom crossing will double the amount of food and medicine reaching gazans. until now, aid agencies have only been able to access the territory through the rafah crossing from egypt. israel has kept up its bombardment of gaza, killing dozens more people. in a change of tone you can generally have joined calls for a sustainable ceasefire. prime minister benjamin netanyahu insists benjamin neta nyahu insists israel will fight benjamin netanyahu insists israel will fight to the end but reuters is quoting egyptian circularity sources as saying israel and hamas are open to a ceasefire but disagree over the terms. our correspondent lucy williamson
shipping companies may ask and halfback lloyd, another big shipping container company, have both announced they would stop sending shipping through the strait. i ll show you where thatis the strait. i ll show you where that is so it s here, at the south side of the red sea, and at the north side of the rest see, we have the suez canal. that s red sea. these are two of the world s biggest choke if anything, it halts shipping. making its way through to india or europe, or the unit states, it has to come here, they re here, through the straits of gibraltar before going further west or north from there. the alternative is to go south through the cape of good hope, adding 9 11; days potentially on the journey time. the suez canal authority has given a statement, saying, they are quite keen that business continues to flow through their. they have said that on sunday, 77 ships made their way through the suez canal, which i think is fairly normal. they said in recent weeks, since 1
there have been concerned that the israel hamas would spread the region. here s our business reporter david waddell. the southern end of the red sea, the northern end of the suez canal. you can t get through the suez canal unless you make your way through this chokepoint. two companies have announced they will make that acid. one is the shipping container company maersk and the other is hapag lloyd. you need to make this much longer passage around the cape of good hope in south africa. that might add nine days, possibly more to thejourney might add nine days, possibly more to the journey if you go to europe, possibly six days to the united states. four ships traversing from the atlantic to the pacific ocean through the panama canal, there are additional issues. it s here from the independent economist. when you look at trade from shanghai to new york and asia to the east coast of the us, if we can t go through the panama canal, because it is very constrained because of the lo