TRANSCRIPT
Sound effects: Excavator working
An excavator lowers 80 unidentified bodies into a mass grave in Gaza's southern city of Rafah.
The bodies were handed over by Israel through its border with the besieged enclave, with the corpses believed to have been collected from Israel's ground operation in the north.
Israel has intensified its bombing campaign in the Gaza Strip over Christmas with 241 people reported killed in just 24 hours from Christmas to Boxing Day [[26th Dec]].
The Gaza Health Ministry, which is run by Hamas health officials but is considered a trustworthy source by the United Nations and health organisations, says almost 21,000 people have been killed in Gaza since October 7 with thousands more feared buried under rubble. .
Israel's military chief says their war in Gaza is likely to go on for many more months despite global calls for a ceasefire.
Chief of the General Staff Herzi Halevi says defeating Hamas will require determined and persistent fighting.
Hebrew then voiceover: "This war has necessary and not easy goals to achieve, it takes place in complex territory. Therefore the war will go on for many months and we will employ different methods to maintain our achievements for a long time."
Since Hamas killed 1,200 people and captured 240 hostages in southern Israel on October 7, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has responded with an assault that has laid much of Gaza to waste.
The United Nations has once again voiced alarm over Israel's killing of civilians with the U-N Human Rights Office reiterating calls for an immediate end to the violence.
In response, Israeli government spokesman Eylon Levy says the country will no longer grant automatic visas to United Nations employees, accusing the U-N of being “complicit partners” in Hamas’ tactics.
"In failing to condemn Hamas for hijacking aid and failing to condemn it for waging war out of hospitals, they have been complicit partners in Hamas’s human shields strategy. They have let the world down. We are demanding global accountability. And now we are leading by example - the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has announced that visa request by UN employees will no longer be granted automatically and will instead be considered on a case-by-case basis."
Israel's claims that militants are operating out of hospitals have been denied by Hamas and an investigation by the Washington Post into earlier claims of a command centre underneath Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City argues there is not sufficient evidence for such a claim.
Israel claims it is doing what it can to protect civilians in its bombardment, but their closest ally the United States says it must do more to reduce civilian deaths from what US President Joe Biden called their "indiscriminate bombing."
An analysis of Copernicus Sentinel-1 satellite data has found Israel’s offensive has destroyed over two-thirds of all structures in northern Gaza and a quarter of buildings in the southern area of Khan Younis.
In 11 weeks of conflict it has killed more civilians than the US-led coalition did in its three-year campaign against I-S.
And in addition to those who have been killed, there are close to 55,000 Palestinians wounded in Gaza.
One of those is 22-year-old university student Shaimaa Nabahin who was given the choice to lose her left leg or risk death.
After her ankle was partially severed by an Israeli airstrike, she agreed to have her leg amputated due to the threat of blood poisoning.
"My whole life has changed, from being a healthy person who was able to control all the details of my life, now in the simplest thing I need help from another person, even sleeping. I cannot sleep well, just like a normal person who sleeps well and moves. Currently, it is impossible to sleep without a pain killer or sedative. Even walking, I don't walk at all. If I want to take a step or go anywhere, I need help.”
Meanwhile, there are new concerns the conflict could spread throughout the region with fighting between US and Iran-aligned forces.
An Israeli airstrike outside the Syrian capital Damascus killed a senior adviser in Iran's Revolutionary Guards.
Sources told Reuters that the adviser, known as Sayyed Razi Mousavi, was responsible for coordinating the military alliance between Syria and Iran.
In response, Iran's president Ebrahim Raisi promised that Israel “will certainly pay" for the attack.
This also comes as Israel accuses Iran of supporting Houthi rebels in Yemen who have disrupted trade routes in the Red Sea and fired drones and missiles at Israeli territory in response to the conflict in Gaza.
Israel's military spokesperson Daniel Hagari says they intercepted a hostile aerial target from the Houthis which they see as an act of terrorism directed by Iran.
"Today an Israeli fighter jet intercepted a hostile aerial target in the Red Sea area, which was en route to Israeli territory. It did not cross into Israeli territory. The Houthi fire toward Israeli territory is an act of terrorism. It is an act directed by Iran and by means of Iranian intelligence and weapons."
