TRANSCRIPT
With the number of casualties in the Gaza strip rising daily, the situation in The Middle East remains fraught.
Israel's Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, says his country is preparing a ground invasion of Gaza, but has again declined to provide any details on the timing of the operation.
He says the decision on when his forces would go into the Palestinian enclave, controlled by the military group Hamas, will be taken by the Israeli government's special war cabinet.
“We are raining hellfire on Hamas. We have already killed thousands of terrorists and this is only the beginning. Simultaneously, we are preparing for a ground invasion. I will not elaborate on when, how or how many. I will also not elaborate on the various calculations we are making, which the public is mostly unaware of - and that is how things should be.”
Mr Netanyahu detailed Israel's objectives from the current mission.
“We are in the middle of a war for our existence. We have set two goals for the war: to annihilate Hamas by destroying its military and governance abilities and to do everything possible to bring our hostages back home.”
Israel has carried out days of intense bombardment of the densely populated Gaza Strip following the October 7 Hamas attacks on Israeli communities that killed around 1,400 people.
According to Gaza's health ministry, more than 6,500 Palestinians have been killed in the retaliatory bombardments so far.
However United States President Joe Biden says he has no confidence in the numbers provided by Gaza's health ministry.
“What they say to me is I have no notion that the Palestinians are telling the truth about how many people are killed. I'm sure innocents have been killed and it's a price of waging a war. I think we should be incredibly careful. I think, not we, Israelis should be incredibly careful to be sure that they're focusing on going after the folks that are propagating this war against Israel.”
Meanwhile, Israeli officials have expressed their outrage over the United Nation's Secretary General's statement that the deadly Hamas attacks on southern Israel "did not happen in a vacuum".
Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen cancelled a scheduled meeting with Mr Guterres, while Israel’s representative to the U-N, Gilad Erdan, called for the Secretay General's resignation, saying Israel must rethink its relations with the world body.
Mr Guterres has expressed his disbelief at the misinterpretation of his comments regarding the war in the Middle East.
“I am shocked by the misrepresentations by some of my statement yesterday in the Security Council, as if I was justifying acts of terror by Hamas. This is false. It was the opposite. In the beginning of my intervention yesterday, I clearly stated, and I quote: ‘I have condemned unequivocally the horrifying and unprecedented 7 October acts of terror by Hamas in Israel. Nothing can justify the deliberate killing, injuring and kidnapping of civilians or the launching of rockets against civilian targets.’ End quote. Indeed, I spoke of the grievances of the Palestinian people.”
A United Nations expert has again called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, as Israel intensified bombings of the southern parts of the strip.
Officials say record numbers of Palestinians have been killed once again, as violence flares elsewhere in the Middle East and a showdown looms at the United Nations over aid for the besieged enclave.
Francesca Albanese, the U-N Special Rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories, says Israel is violating international law by punishing all Palestinians for the actions of Hamas.
“Shouldn't a ceasefire be declared immediately to stop all this? Because I understand that pursuing a legitimate goal could be to ensure Israel's security could be dismantling the military capacity of Hamas. But what Israel is doing is not that. What Israel is doing is punishing an entire Palestinian population for what Hamas has done. This is not self-defence.”
A strike in the Nusseirat refugee camp in southern Gaza killed family members of Al-Jazeera Arabic's Bureau Chief in Gaza, Wael Dahdouh.
Footage aired on the network shows the veteran journalist weeping over his son's body.
Al-Jazeera released a statement saying the shelling had resulted in the tragic loss of the journalist's wife, son, daughter and grandson, while other family members remain buried under the rubble.
Mr Dahdouh says the Palestinian people are not going to surrender.
“Of course we are a big calamity right now. A big tragedy especially is perpetrated against women and children. No more no less than a calamity. Large numbers of people's houses bombarded. However, this is a custom of the Israeli occupation. At the end of the day we are in on this land. This is our destiny, this is our destiny and this is our choice and this is our patience and we won't deviate from this path.”
