israel s prime minister benjamin netanyahu says the war in gaza has entered a second phase, warning it will be long and difficult. speaking at a joint news conference with his defence minister, yoav gallant, and emergency war cabinet member benny gantz, mr netanyahu described the conflict as israel s second war of independence. he declared israel would win the war and make every effort to bring the hostages home. in his first comments since the war began on the seventh of october, hamas s leader in the gaza strip has offered to release all hostages being held in gaza in return for the release of all hamas prisoners in israeli jails. in a statement, yahya sinwar says, we are ready for an immediate exchange deal that includes the release of all prisoners in the prisons of the zionist enemy in exchange for the release of all prisoners with the resistance. it comes 2a hours after israel stepped up its bombardment of gaza. you can see that in these pictures here. israel said
israel s prime minister is meeting the families of israeli hostages held, who are worried about the intensifying attacks on gaza. and right now we are striking from the air every single day when we do not know where my cousin is, where we do not know where over 200 hostages are and we don t know if any of our bombs have killed them. here in london, pro palestinian demonstrators turn out in force. we demonstrators turn out in force. will talk to our co| a we will talk to our correspondent in a moment. protests are also taking place in other capital cities, with calls for a ceasefire. fresh aid enters gaza, and the un tells the bbc they ve managed to reestablish some contact with their teams on the ground. communications have been down for such a long while. we have been talking to the un who have been using satellite phones to get some contact with their teens, but broadly the situation of communications blackout is still in place. that is the backdrop in gaza. our corresponde
after most communication networks were cut overnight. we are alive in southern israel. this is bbc news. let me show you some live pictures of what is happening and gaza right now. you could normally see the skyline behind me. the buildings of gaza. but the smoke that is really blotting out the skyline at the moment and the fog are making it very difficult to see what is going on there. but our cameras inside gaza can show you the scene after that night of intensifying air strikes that we have seen and heard. you can hear them going on around us all the time. in fact, we are seeing, where we are now, a position very close to the border with gaza, you can hear the explosions. we are being told, people around us, to make sure we are wearing a protective equipment, wearing helmets and body armour because, as you can hear quite clearly around us, there is this rolling intensification of israeli fire on gaza. you can hear the sound of monitors, you can hear the sound of artillery