may be some that even though there may be some bad apples, there are thousands and thousands of workers who are committed absolutely and robustly to their humanitarian mandate. a houthi missile hits a british—linked oil tanker off the coast of yemen. the uk government threatens retaliation. donald trump says he'll appeal against a court order to pay 83 million dollars in damages to a woman he defamed. hello — i'm rajini vaidyanathan. welcome to this hour. the uk hasjoined the us, australia, italy, finland and canada in suspending funding to the un relief and works agency for palestinian refugees — also known as unrwa. israel has accused some unrwa staff of being involved in the seventh of october attacks, in which hamas killed about 1,200 people. unrwa's head said a full investigation into the allegations

is being carried out — and anyone found to have been involved will be held accountable. philippe lazzarini added... this latest news comes as pressure grows on the israeli government to change its conduct in its war with hamas. it has intensified its bombing of gaza, despite the international court ofjustice ruling on friday that israel must do everything possible to prevent genocide there. that israel must do everything here's our middle east correspondent mark lowen. israel is seizing on another development as proof of what it says is the un's bias against it, which is that 12 members of staff of the un mission operating in gaza have been dismissed for... as they were found to be, to have been complicit in the hamas attacks on israel on the 7th of october. now, israel says that is proof that the un mission in gaza is not impartial — that it is pro—hamas. what the united nations and

pro—un voices are saying is, "look, the entire workforce of that un agency is 30,000 people, "so 12 bad apples should not tarnish the entire "reputation of the un agency." but, you know, israel is saying this is proof that, "we are fighting," in israel's words, "a just war, "and we have the right to defend ourselves." chris gunness is a former chief spokesperson for unrwa, and now director of the myanmar accountability project. he gave me his reaction to the situation. i begin by condemning supporting the attack of the 7th of october but may i first pay tribute to the thousands of unrwa staff who have worked courageously under 2,000lb bombs and other huge ammunitions flying into gaza

to bring humanitarian support to an embattled population. can i also offer my condolences to the families of more than 150 staff members who have been killed. my reaction, as you've been asked, to this defunding and the accusations. first of all, on the accusations, unrwa has a zero—tolerance policy towards these kinds of violations of its neutrality. it always investigates credible reports of this. this has clearly happened, and what better evidence of unrwa's commitment to its zero—tolerance policy than the fact that even before the investigation was finished, commissioner general, the executive, the chief executive of unrwa, philippe lazzarini has dismissed these people? that is clear evidence of a zero—tolerance policy and i have to report that back to its donors. 0n the defunding, i have to say that is very sad because the donors have said repeatedly when i was at unrwa and since that unrwa's work is life—saving.

it is said that unrwa contributes via its development and humanitarian work to the stability of the middle east, so it is very sad to be seeing those same donors withdrawing their funds to these life—saving and regionally stabilising services and to say before i finish this answer it may be that with 15,000 staff, there are some bad apples among unrwa staff. they are working in an extremely complex and polarised environment. but you know, let us not lose sight of the fact that even though there may be some bad apples, there are thousands and thousands of workers in unrwa who are committed absolutely and robustly to their humanitarian mandate. that may be the case, chris, but these are very serious accusations. accusations that these members of staff were involved in the 7th of october attacks. it is. it is very serious indeed and unrwa is taking this very seriously. can i say that when i was a unrwa spokesperson, particularly

in the 2014 war, israel and israeli spokespeople, both civilian and military, made the most extraordinary allegations about unrwa, many of which turned out to be utterly baseless. when the israelis attacked our schools on the 2014 war, they said that there were militants in our schools. that was investigated. that was shown to be complete nonsense. we had allegations that unrwa was hiding rockets components in its schools, it was colluding with hamas terrorists. we investigated immediately. in fact, it was unrwa who found the rocket parts in its schools, immediately reported to all our major donors and israelis condemned it. what did we get in reply in response from the israelis? we got further accusations, in spite of having done all this, that we were colluding with terrorists. so there is a long history of these

allegations being made by israel, its spokespeople, even at the level of the prime minister's office and its friends in various organisations. in the large number of cases — and i've not seen the evidence and i'm not saying this is the case here — but i think we have been very clear, there is a history to these allegations and when they are shown to be well—founded, unrwa will investigate and always take disciplinary action up to and including dismissal — which, by the way, in gaza, means the staff member and their family falls below the poverty line because unrwa is the main employer. sorry. i want to put this to you because on x, formerly twitter, israel's foreign minister has said that they have been warning for years about this. they say unrwa perpetuates the refugee issue, obstructs peace and — this is a strong accusation — serves as a civilian arm of hamas in gaza. what would you say to that? well, i mean, it's interesting that we have got a member of the cabinet and his fellow cabinet ministers have effectively

just been accused of inciting genocide at the international criminal court are saying that unrwa is an impediment to peace. so let's get that accusation into some kind of context. but on this question of unrwa perpetuating the conflict, that i think is a nod to the fact that unrwa — like all refugee populations around the world, unhcr, the other un agency that deals with refugees — they, too, always register the children of refugees and that's something that is refugee practice throughout the world. so israel always says unrwa is unique in registering the children of refugees and are perpetuaitng the conflict. that is simply not true. unhcr also registers the children of refugees. what actually perpetuates this crisis, the conflict in the middle east is the failure of the parties to resolve it. that is israel and the palestinians. that is what perpetuates the crisis — not the work of an agency humanitarian succour

in times of war and alleged genocide that we now seeing. just seeing on the via reuters news agency that is well�*s foreign ministry is also now are urging more countries to post the link at the agency and saying they want. —— saying they want the agency replaced in more countries to cut ties. let's get more now on the uk joining other countries in halting funding for unrwa. 0ur political correspondent harry farley has been closely following the developments. i've been speaking to sources in the foreign office in the last hour or so, and they tell me the uk has committed 60 million so far to the humanitarian situation in gaza. that has not all been paid. that goes out in tranches, in different instalments. the next instalment is due in april and what the foreign office ares saying is they are pausing that future funding, so the future instalments of that money that the uk

government has committed, they are pausing that until this investigation is concluded. a foreign office spokesman said that the uk is appalled by these allegations against unrwa staff, that they were involved in the attack on the 7th of october, a heinous act of terrorism that the government has repeatedly condemned. that's the foreign office statement this afternoon. and what more do we know, harry, about the background in terms of how long the uk government's been funding unrwa and what the relationship is? well, unrwa is the main united nations body that works with palestinians in gaza. it is also the main body that the uk sends funds to if it wants to get funding to the palestinians in gaza. and, as mark was saying, you know, israel has long accused different branches of the united nations, including unrwa, of bias and even anti—semitism and it is obviously saying that this proves that narrative. unrwa, from their point of view, maintain that they are doing vital work to ease the humanitarian situation in gaza and say they're one of the only organisations who are still working there. do we know any more about this investigation, then? what we understand is that israel handed evidence to unrwa that some of its staff were involved in the 7th of october attacks. unrwa themselves say

that they are looking into it, they have launched an investigation and have sacked those members of staff in the meantime. and, of course, just briefly, harry, this comes as the uk is nowjoining the us, australia, italy and canada when it comes to suspending funding to unrwa? yes, that's right. it's a growing coalition of countries. the us state department said it was extremely troubled by the allegations, and as you say, australia, italy and canada alsojoining in, those countries suspending future funding to unrwa. harry farley there. inside gaza, israel is pressing ahead with its military operation with tanks advancing into khan younis, in southern gaza, where thousands of people have been forced to flee. gaza's health ministry says 174 palestinians have been killed in israeli strikes in the past 24 hours. that takes the total reported killed in gaza since the war started to at least 26,257. the head of the cia is expected to meet officials from israel, egypt and qatar in the coming days, in an attempt to negotiate the release of hostages held by hamas, which many western

governments consider a terrorist organisation. let's hear more from mark lowen — here he is on those upcoming talks. they are due to begin, we understand, as early as sunday, tomorrow, in france, there are reports, but the cia has not confirmed the location or the start date. and they will involve bill burns, the head of the cia, who's meeting with his opposite numbers at mossad, israel's intelligence agency, and the egyptian spy agency, as well, and top officials from qatar, to try to revive attempts at finding a ceasefire — making progress towards a ceasefire in this conflict. tomorrow, sunday, will be three months since israel launched its ground offensive in gaza, and the warring sides are still far apart on ceasefire proposals. we understand from reports that

israel has mooted the idea of a one or two—month pause in fighting or truce, and the phased release of israeli hostages and palestinian prisoners. but hamas is said to be demanding a permanent ceasefire as part of any hostage release deal. now, the fact that they are, these talks are due to take place show that the wheels of diplomacy are turning faster. president biden spoke to the emir of qatar and the president of egypt on friday, yesterday. and it all comes, of course, as the international court ofjustice says that israel must do all it can to prevent genocide in gaza, placing renewed focus and renewed scrutiny on the israeli forces�* actions down in gaza. that is mark lowen there, our correspondent in the middle east. a fire on board an oil tanker which has links to the uk has been put out, a day after it was struck by a houthi missile, off the coast of yemen. these pictures show that fire on board the marlin luanda. the houthis said it was targeted on friday in response to what they called "american—british aggression".

the operator of the ship, trafigura, paid tribute to the bravery of the captain and crew and thanked the indian, us and french navies for their help. in a statement the company said... we are pleased to confirm that all crew on board the marlin luanda are safe and the fire in the cargo tank has been fully extinguished. the vessel is now sailing towards a safe harbour. the crew continues to monitor the vessel and cargo closely. this latest incident follows us and uk air strikes on houthi targets in response to attacks on ships in the red sea region — one of the world's busiest shipping lanes. the uk government says it reserves the right to respond appropriately. in the last few minutues the defence secretary grant shapps said "this intolerable and illegal attack on maritime shipping is the latest on innocent people and global trade. "it is our duty to protect freedom of navigation in the red sea and we remain as committed to that cause as ever." 0ur diplomatic correspondent paul adams reports. this is the marlin luanda, carrying russian oil from greece to singapore —

the latest houthi target. the houthis were quick to take credit, their spokesman saying once again that this was being done to support the palestinians in gaza and in response to what he described as american—british aggression. it's been two weeks since britain and the us first hit back, striking military targets inside yemen, aiming to deter the houthis. so far, the strategy doesn't appear to be working. so the attack on the marlin luanda in the gulf of aden signifies a great extension and escalation from the red sea to the gulf of aden, so a geographical extension, and also with the type of weapons. the missile used yesterday was a ballistic missile, and the houthis started their attacks in the red sea using drones, so we're seeing a technological expansion and a geographical extension. the houthis are using the attacks to bolster support at home, orchestrating huge rallies on the streets of the capital, sanaa,

relishing this confrontation with the west — something they've thought about and planned for for years. they're being helped by iran. when us navy seals seized a dhow off the coast of somalia earlier this month, they found parts of ballistic and anti—ship cruise missiles. diplomats say weapons are also being smuggled through 0man. the marlin luanda is operated by a uk—registered company. here, a government spokesman said britain and its allies reserve the right to respond. paul adams, bbc news. now it's time for a look at today's sport. news about maidstone today? yes, a big upset in england's fa cup. as the lowest ranked side left in the competition, non—league maidstone united have knocked out championship side

ipswich town in the fourth round maidstone are 98 places and four divisions below ipswich in the english football pyramid... but goals from lamar reynolds and sam corne helped them to a 2—1 win at portman road... it's a day their supporters will never forget. they needed a few heroics from their brazilian goalkeeper lucas covolan and had to see out eight minutes of added time, but held on for a famous win, much to the delight of their manager, george elokobi. this one binds us from life now. in the last round we are tied, the maidstone united football club, the maidstone united football club, the maidstone united football club, the maidstone united community, our supporters richly deserve this. we are tied for life, we had bound flight. and my community back in cameroon, my town and my college, saintjosephs college, her painting you all in the entire country proud and the entire proud. —— i hope i am doing you all proud. t0 there are five other matches on saturday...

leeds lead plymouth argyle by a goal to nil. sheffield united have come from 2—2 down at brighton in the late game sees fulham take on newcastle. next to melbourne, where aryna sabalenka has won the women's australian open singles title for the second year in a row. the number two seed beat china's zhung chinwen — ——the number two seed beat china's zheng qingwen — playing in herfirst grand slam final — in straight sets 6—3, 6—2. 0ur tennis correspondent russell fuller was watching: the whole fortnight she has been very impressive end underlined why many people think she is the favourite. not an easy thing to do,

defending a grand slam title for the first time, and to do so without dropping a set. in this final she made a fast start, probably zheng qinwen having not played any top 50 opponents to get the final was a little bit taken aback and took a little bit of time to get used to the pace of aryna sabalenka's ball. after the break, zheng qinwen said three double faults in her opening service game and second she felt the writing was on the wall and there wasn't too much on the way ofjeopardy. it always felt as if aryna sabalenka was in control of the final. great win for sabalenka — but there's been disappointment for the british defending champion alfie hewitt, who's lost the men's wheelchair singles final to the japanese 17 —year—old tokito 0da hewett was beaten in straight sets by the same player he lost the wimbledon final to last summer// but he will still leave melbourne with silverware... with he and his partner gordon reid having already been crowned men's doubles champions. for 0da, it's his third grand slam singles title: and india's rohan bopanna, who will become the oldest world number one at the age of 43 when the doubles rankings come out on monday, has won the men's doubles title with his partner matthew ebden. they've beaten simone bolelli and andrea vavassori in straight sets. it's bopanna's first men's

doubles grand slam title. england's 0llie pope has staged a one man rescue act, to keep england's hopes alive in the opening test against india, england's 0llie pope has staged a one man rescue act, to keep england's hopes alive in the opening test against india, in hyderabad. with wickets falling all around him, and the tourists in trouble, pope's epic 148 not out on day three has dragged england to 316—6 in their second innings, 126 runs ahead with four wickets in hand. the way that pope has played today, honestly, it's an absolutely massive class in how to bat in these conditions is an overseas player, someone that's not exposed to these services stay in, day out, to come off the back of a serious injury like you had in summer, had that amount of time out of the game and then put together that, well, that... i'm speechless. honestly, it's one of the best knocks that i have ever seen. jae it's one of the best knocks that i have ever seen.— it's one of the best knocks that i have ever seen. joe root fair. i can tell ou have ever seen. joe root fair. i can tell you that _ have ever seen. joe root fair. i can tell you that brighton _ have ever seen. joe root fair. i can tell you that brighton have - have ever seen. joe root fair. i can tell you that brighton have just -

tell you that brighton have just retaken the lead against sheffield united 3— to bramall lane. that is all your sport than out. studio: a busy day in sport. we will be back updates later. donald trump says he'll appeal against a court order to pay $83 million in damages to a woman he defamed. ejean carroll said the former us president destroyed her reputation when he said she'd lied about him sexually assaulting her in the 1990s. a jury in a previous civil fraud trial found ms carroll was sexually abused by trump back then. she said the ruling was a "great victory for every woman". mr trump said he'll appeal. nada tawfik reports from new york. ejean carroll has now taken on donald trump twice in court, both times emerging victorious. last may, he was found liable for sexual abuse and defamation, and ordered to pay her $5 million in damages. this second defamation trial looks set to cost him far more — $83 million. donald trump was not present when the verdict was read. and earlier, he stormed out of court

when ejean carroll's lawyer was delivering her closing statement, arguing that the former president acted as if the law didn't apply to him. afterwards, he slammed the verdict on social media as "absolutely ridiculous" and a politically motivated witch—hunt directed by president biden. we will immediately appeal. we will set aside that ridiculous jury and i just want to remind you all of one thing. i will continue with president trump to fight for everybody�*s first amendment right to speak. everybody has a right to defend themselves when they are wrongfully accused, and to be able to say, "i didn't do it". donald trump has repeatedly denied raping the former advice columnist at a department store in the �*90s. ejean carroll's lawyer submitted as evidence videos and posts where trump continued to defame her while the trial was taking place. i have no idea who she is, where she came from. this is another scam. it's a political witch—hunt.

the damages awarded to ejean carroll were far more than the 24 million she asked for. it signals that the jury agreed with her lawyers that only a very large sum that would hurt donald trump financially would convince him to stop. in a statement, ejean carroll described the verdict as a victory for every woman who stands up when she's been knocked down and a huge defeat for every bully who's tried to keep a woman down. donald trump has plenty of other upcoming trials, where he faces a total of 91 felony counts and the threat ofjail time. but so far, it hasn't dented his chances of becoming the republican presidential nominee. quite the opposite — it's energised his base. nada tawfik, bbc news, new york. the us government has approved the sale of 40 new f—16 fighter jets to turkey, after ankara fully ratified sweden's long—

delayed membership of nato. turkey will also get upgrades to the warplanes in its existing fleet as part of the 23 billion dollar deal. the sale had become contingent on turkey dropping its objections to sweden joining the alliance. f—16s are the same jets that ukrainian pilots are being trained on. queen camilla has left a london clinic after visiting king charles, who remains in hospital following a procedure for an enlarged prostate. he's been at the private hospital since friday. it's the same hospital where catherine, princess of wales, had surgery last week. our reporter ellie price gives us this update, from outside the london hospital. well, the queen visited her husband around 2.5 hours ago and we understand she is probably still in there. now, she was by his side yesterday, of course, when he arrived for that operation on the enlarged pro—state. we are told it is a fairly standard procedure that he had and it is not unusual to stay for my son to hospital. she stayed

overnight and we're not sure if he coming here to visit all be here overnight. we have commentary as to exactly what is going on from that point of view and of course it is worth remembering that the queen herself may be visiting another member of the royal family because, of course, the king's daughter—in—law, kath and princess of wales, is also in the same hospital having received surgery on her abdomen, 12 days ago, an operation that we didn't get too many details on but we were told it should be in hospitalfor around two weeks with that and, as i say, it is datable for her. it mayjust be the queen colin miller has been visiting catherine, princess of wales, too. —— as i say, it is day 12 for catherine, princess of wales, so it may be that queen camilla has been visiting her to. us politicians have called for new laws to criminalise the creation of deepfake images, after explicit ai—generated images

of taylor swift were viewed millions of times on x, formerly known as twitter. taylor swift's fans, or �*swifties�*, rallied to flood the platform with posts and drown out the so—called �*deepfakes'. one faked picture of the star — on x — was viewed 47 million times before it was taken down. we're going to take a look at what is supposed to be the driest place in the us. this is death valley in southern california — and, as you can see, it's not very dry at all. but you need to be quick if you want to visit — scientists say it's drying up fast, and may not be there for much longer. stay with us here on bbc news. hello. temperatures have been a little bit higher today, but we have seen more cloud around, particularly across more western parts of the uk. a lot of the cloud is still quite thin. high cloud, mind you. a lot of the cloud is still quite thin, high cloud, mind you. and if you have a look at the satellite picture, you can see all that cloud that's

been coming in from the atlantic to the south of our weather front that's been hanging around in the north and north—west of scotland, bringing some outbreaks of rain. but through the night, as we see a southerly wind picking up, we're going to blow that rain band out of the way. it still could be quite cloudy in northern ireland and scotland, bit of dampness in the air now and again. rather more variable cloud across england and wales. and last night it got to minus three at exeter airport. lowest temperatures will be across eastern parts of england where we have clearer skies. there could be a touch of ground frost first thing on sunday morning. but with that wind picking up on sunday, we should see temperatures continuing to rise and most places will have a dry day again. some sunshine at times, a bit more cloud in the south west of england, maybe moving into the midlands and ahead of our rain band approaching northern ireland and heading into the north—west of scotland, it's going to be windy with some gales in the north—west, some quite lively winds developing through the irish sea as well. but it is a southerly wind and that's why temperatures are continuing to rise. it's going to be a milder day

on sunday, it could make 14 degrees in north wales and the moray firth. now those southerly winds are coming from a long way south and they could actually pick up some saharan dust, which will get blown in towards the uk just ahead of that weather front there, which will bring some wet weather. and we've got a bit more rain pushing towards england and wales could turn quite heavy rain over the hills of wales, across northern england and in the southern uplands. we're likely to find some snow falling as things get colder in scotland and northern ireland. but for the midlands, many parts of eastern england it may well be dry and we're in milder air here. so temperatures are likely to reach 14 or 15 degrees. that milder air, though, will get pushed away overnight as these weather fronts move their way eastwards, could bring some snow to other higher parts of eastern scotland before that, low pressure is out of the way and all the wet weather is out of the way. leaving cloud for england and wales, sunshine across scotland and northern ireland. that'll push a bit further south through the day. it will introduce cooler air, mind you. so we've got eight degrees in glasgow. could make 12 degrees in the southeast.

could make 12 degrees in the south—east.

this is bbc news. the headlines: the uk joins a list of countries to suspend funding for a un agency in gaza after israel accuses some staff of involvement in the 7th of october attack. unrwa has announced it has sacked a number of staff and is investigating the accusations. a houthi missile strikes a british—linked oil tanker off the coast of yemen.

the houthis say the attack was in response to what they called us and british aggression. a jury in new york orders donald trump to pay $83 million in damages to the writer ejean carroll. mr trump had already been found to have defamed her with comments he made in 2019. the owner ofjohn lewis and waitrose is considering cutting up to 11,000 staffjobs in the next five years as part of a plan to improve efficiency. now on bbc news, newscast. chris, what do you think is the most iconic item of clothing in the uk at the moment on tv? well... traitor style cloak or you're missing tie from the ten o'clock —— traitor style cloak or your missing tie from the ten o'clock news on wednesday night? well, ithink, you know, the traitor style cloak probably pips the tie, i will acknowledge that,

despite my relative ignorance, total ignorance about the traitors.