♪ >> announcer: this is al jazeera. ♪ hello there, welcome to the news hour live from the headquarters in doha, i'm julie and this program is dominated by two news story, israel will step up the ground of gaza as tanks and troops move in. [gunfire] air strikes continue, 24 palestinians have been killed in the latest violence. also coming up, what brought down a malaysian air flight 17

and promise access to the crash sight. malaysian government said it is against decency if the plane was shot down. so two major news stories for you this news hour, in a moment we will have the latest on the crash of malaysian airlines flight mh 17 which came down in eastern ukraine, all 298 people on board were killed. but we begin in gaza where israel launched a ground offensive and prepared to widen the operation that began overnight. palestinians in gaza faced attacks from the air and sea over the last ten days and now from tanks and soldiers. hamas which runs the territory condemned the invasion, at least 265 palestinians have been

killed since the violence began, 24 of them died overnight and on friday morning. people in gaza say they have been terrified by the invasion. mary anna hunt reports. >> reporter: it started in the early hours, a steady stream of israeli tanks and troops making their way into gaza. israel wants to stop hamas fighters from using tunnels to get in israel and the prime minister admits they have been unable to destroy the under ground network from the air and from the sea. >> translator: since it's impossible to deal with the tunnels by air, our troops are dealing with it on the ground, here as well there are no guarantees for total success but we do the up most to achieve the best result. >> reporter: as the israeli troops and tanks moved in on the ground, missiles continued to hit targets, fired from the sea and from the air using drones and air 16s. people living there say it's

terrifying. one hospital in eastern gaza was evacuated as israel intensified its bombardment there. this building housed a large number of media companies. the people in this home were given a two-minute warning to get out, the house was destroyed. but in the densely-populated gaza strip with many hundreds of people already displaced and the borders closed, there is no where to run to, i'm with al jazeera. well, let's go to gaza now and speak live to al jazeera's stephanie decker and stephanie, this must be hugely terrifying for people in gaza, watching these tanks gathering at the border, seeing them come over the border and there is no where they can go. >> absolutely. well, that is one of the examples of the siege here which we are just hearing a sermon, it's friday prayers here and this is what is being displayed over the loudspeakers and saying

we need to stand with a resistance and we need to be strong, this is a fight we have been forced into and we need to get our dignity back. that is something that many people will tell you, this is what the factions are saying, they want to get something out of this fight, they don't want to agree to any cease fire without the lifting of the siege and people here cannot come and go as they please, there is a war going on here and others are streaming across borders into other countries and this is not possible here, they are stuck and that is absolutely terrifying for them and they will tell you it's a matter of independence, it's a matter of the palestinian state and now for over six decades nothing has been solved and this is a conflict that is not only just about here and now, there is a context to it and many people will tell you even if this fighting end, the core issue needs to be addressed. but coming back for your question, absolutely terrified. they don't know how this is going to play out and terrified they will come further in

especially around the border areas, the areas this is now concentrated on in the far north of the gaza strip on the border areas and also in the south, this is where a lot of at the moment we are hearing artillery is coming in the areas and relatively quiet of what we hear in the areas but certainly doesn't mean anything, we have intense bombardment of this area in the last two hours or so, that now again has quieted down. but this very much an on going operation. >> those bombardments continuing and we have seen some very questionable targets, stephanie, a building which houses media organizations, hospitals where patients have had to be evacuated. >> there is a building to the left of us actually which was hit, i'll show you, three missiles struck that this morning and houses a couple media organizations, also businesses. it's like an office block. you can see right at the top three missiles struck that and

certainly that was extremely violent and heard three children killed in the north, killed by a tank shell. they have also targeted a hospital, this is a hospital very close to the border. that has been targeted before. the director there i spoke with him overnight as this is happening and he says you know i told israel many times if you target my hospital i will lose my patients and we are told the hospital is owned by hamas but this is the only rehabilitation hospital here. they have no manage to evacuate all those patients, but it was extremely distressing and panicking and people who cannot move. the targeting being questioned and they might say they might have connections to hamas but they house civilians and that death toll is rising and it's now 265 over the last ten days of conflict. over 2000 injured. we spoke to the hospital. they are struggling to cope with the influx. so it's a situation that is

unfolding. it's violent and people here know the death toll will increa increase. >> stephanie thank you very much for that, stephanie decker in gaza for us. well in addition to all the palestinian casualties one israeli soldier has also been killed. israeli army says two other soldiers were wounded in the ground offensive overnight. meanwhile benjamin netanyahu has been speaking to the israeli cabinet and saying he wants to widen the scope of the ground offensive, let's speak to the israeli town on the gaza border and tell us about that cabinet meeting and netanyahu saying that the current ground offensive he wants to expand its scope. >> reporter: yes, he made these statements to the head of the security cabinet meeting where

he says that he and his minister of defense have ordered the israeli chief of staff and the army to prepare for a significant widening of this operation if necessary. he said. he also said that this ground operation was only ordered after israel exhausted all -- excuse me -- options to restore calm. he said this happened after hamas rejected cease fire proposals and israel committed to humanitarian polls and hostility on thursday and israel basically was forced into the situation. he justifies this ground operation by saying that navel strikes and air strikes could not possibly be able to destroy under ground tunnels that now the israeli army is seeing as a major threat. these are being used by palestinian fighters to fill trait into israel, the army says so and in is why the operation is significant and needed in

order to destroy these tunnels. he also says that israel is against the killing of civilians in gaza but he blames hamas for these deaths of civilians because he says that hamas is a terror organization that is hitting israeli territory from behind civilians. he said that israel basically doesn't know that he can't mention some consideration. there are things that are confidential. but the primary goal of this operation, he says, is to restore calm and the rocket fire and destroy these rocket-launching capabilities. we are hearing more air strikes and i will let the camera and show you not air strikes, rather shelling by tanks right there, and we are two or three kilometers from gaza and close to the gaza strip and maybe adjacent to gaza city. that is some tank shelling we are seeing and have been seeing

this through the day, as you can see black smoke from there and shelling in gaza close to where we are standing. >> that ground offensive at the moment restricted to targeting the tunnels which hamas fighters are using to get into israel. what is your sense of whether there is by and large widespread support for an expanded ground operation because we have already seen one israeli soldier casualty and could be a lot more if that ground offensive becomes more inthey invasive. it's almost inevitable that soldiers would be killed in a ground operation in gaza. i think this is why this operation has been postponed and avoided according to israel for several days. we also understand people are surprised by a couple of incidents that happened in resent days with these -- this

rare incident where tunnels have been dug up where fighters were able to infiltrate into israel through the tunnels and this incident happened yesterday when the army said that it foiled an attack on thursday morning, attempted infiltration attack by 13 palestinian fighters trying to get into southern israeli community called soofa and the israeli spokesperson said had not the army acted immediately to foil this infiltration attempt this attack could have been dizsaster consequences for israel and they are saying these under ground tunnels that palestinian fighters are i'll fi fill -- infiltrating to israel they are there to launch at tacks on israel and completely unacceptable and justifying ground operation saying the under ground tunnels are a huge

threat and must be destroyed with a ground operation because it's not possible to do that with naval strikes or air strikes. >> we wait to see how that ground operation will expand, for the moment and thank you for that and we are in israel very close to the northern gaza border. u.s. secretary of state john kerry has spoken to the prime minister benjamin netanyahu over the telephone to discuss the ground offensive and the secretary confirmed strong support for the ground offensive against hamas' tunnels into israeli territory and encouraged israel to restore the 2012 cease fire quickly to prevent any civilian casualties. >> reporter: earlier in the week the u.s. secretary of state john kerry said that he was prepared to fly to the middle east if that's what it took to help broker some sort of cease fire between the israeli government and hamas. however, once egypt stepped forward with its own proposal

for a cease fire, the secretary of state decided to return to washington because of other pressing foreign policy matters, notably the nuclear disarmament talks with iran. however there are rumors again that kerry might be going to the region now israel decided to launch a ground offensive in gaza but it's not clear whether or not any arrival by the u.s. secretary of state or any other foreign minister for that matter might prevent what seems to be now an all out war. >> just to bring you up to date these are the pictures right now from gaza. as our reporter stephanie decker was saying it has calmed down a little bit in the last few minutes but it has been very intense air strikes over the past two hours and as we were speaking to the reporter by the gaza border we saw another shell coming from one of the israeli tanks which are masked near the border and people in gaza

extremely worried that that ground offensive may well be expanded pretty quickly. don't forget there is plenty of coverage of the conflict in gaza. we have got all the latest developments there on our website, al jazeera.com with live blogs and opinion pieces and a lot more. al jazeera.com. ♪ so now to our other main story, world leaders are calling for a cease fire in ukraine to allow investigators to the crash site of the malaysian airliner shot down in the east, ukraine government described the incident as a crime against humanity and an act of war. all 298 passengers on board were killed when the plane crashed in the area controlled by pro-russia separatists and rebels will agree to a truce for

four days to allow the victims' bodies to be recovered and both sides accused each other of shooting the plane down. the boeing 777 took off from amsterdam at midday local time only its normal route to kuala lumpur and lost contact while in ukraine yanukovich air space and crashed near the village that is 50 kilometers from ukraine's border with russia and phil labell reports. >> reporter: so many questions surround what happened to flight mh 17 but it was shot down is not being disputed. but who shot it down? that is what the world wants to know. >> who could have shot it down? who had the equipment? and there does seem to be some growing awareness that it probably had to be russian insurgents. now, how we determine that will require some forensics but then

if there is evidence pointing in that direction, the equipment had to have come from russia. what more the russians may or may not have done, we don't know. >> reporter: there were no survivors from this crash, 298 lives love as this plane traveled over what is effectively a war zone. >> translator: i've just finished a conversation with the dutch prime minister and expressed my condolence and on behalf of ukraine i invited experts to look at the attack transparently and we call it neither an accident nor a catastrophe, it's a terrorist attack. >> reporter: it was high in the sky, a target for only the most advanced of missiles and both sides blame each other, ukraine security agency says it intercepted a phone call between a leader commander from the donsk republic and his fighters, in it men talk about a downed passenger plane.

>> translator: meanwhile russia defense ministry is saying it picked up radar activity from the ukrainian-controlled book missile system, the same day mh 17 was shot down. >> translator: we on behalf of the russian authorities and on behalf of the government of the russian federation express condolence to bereaved families and governments of those countries whose nationals were on that plane, i ask you to honor their memory. >> reporter: in this regard i want to emphasize this tragedy would not happen if there were peace on that land, if in any case if military had not resumed on the cost of ukraine. >> reporter: this was with

innocent victims, the passengers not involved in the war ten kilometers beneath them but we are learning more about them as each moment passes, 173 dutch nationals among those on board. holiday makers, tourists and hiv aids experts traveling from amsterdam to australia for a world conference, this was just the first leg of their journey, a doomed flight who sabotage has led to a major international incident. phil lavelle, al jazeera. let's speak to scott who is in eastern ukraine and, scott, i know you are at the scene of, well, part of the crash site because we presume it spread over quite a wide area and just describe the scenes there. >> spread over quite a wide area and ten kilometers, a circumference of ten kilometers and we spend the night and not much going on but what we saw in the morning were a lot more

rescue officials and workers' comp ing in and this was after dawn locating the location of the 298 people and this is what it looked like. these are emergency service personnel who have been on the scene for a couple of hours this morning. as you can see they are holding sticks with white cloth on the top of it and marking bodies and walking through these fields here coming on this side, this is a road, a farm road that divides debris fields and they are there and you see sticks out there with remains and what is interesting is what one of the gentlemen when they walked past the debris field a couple minutes ago he said there are too many bodies and we don't have enough stakes so they are moving on to the field. this is the tail section over the aircraft here. the tail fin is here and backup the road you have even bigger debris fields and you have one

on this side and one even further down that seems to be the biggest debris field and you can see the landing gear and both engines are there and there is a bit of a groove in the earth where clearly there was some kind of impact. so these gentlemen are marking where the bodies are but the most important thing right now for the international community because this is now an international incident, is that the investigation as to why these men are looking for bodies took place. >> and, scott, you know, you have given the political considerations of where you are and the fact that it's under the control of pro-russia separatists, how is that investigation going to proceed? what are people telling you about recovery efforts and what happens from now? >> reporter: yeah, well the investigation will probably focus on this area as just enough pieces i was talking about, the larger debris field is where this is. if you look over my shoulder you will see the engines of the 777 aircraft and there is the landing gear there and this is the area of the crash scene

where there is the most material from the aircraft and i would imagine this is where they would start to look because this is the natural spot with all this debris here. what we are hearing is we are hearing that the international community has allowed and had an agreement with the separatist fighters and administration that controls the area and they will allow international investigators to come in and expecting and hearing from sources that that will start this afternoon. but it needs to be said that will almost be close to, if not after 24 hours after this incident. and there are a lot of things going on here, yes, people identifying bodies. local people coming out here and actually there is a truck here who is putting up the power lines here so this in essence is a pretty contaminated site and scene and international investigators will have to come through and there is question if the black box has been found and

we a we are not sure if that is the case but russia says so and they are immediately trying to find that. with this amount of debris from the aircraft, both engines and landing gear here, this is a place they start to look but again it's going to talk a long, long time. it's a wide area here where the debris is spread out. >> scott thank you for that and scott is at the scene of the crash there. and ukraine's prime minister says international investigators have not been able to access the crash site. and they called on the u.n. security council to address what he describes as an act of war on ukraine and europe. >> we ask all respective governments to participate in this investigation and to support the ukrainian government to bring to justice all these people who committed this international crime.

this is the crime against humanity. all red lines have already been crossed. this is the deadline. everyone is to be accountable and responsible. i mean, everyone who supports these terrorists. including russia federation and russian review. >> russia president called for a thorough and unbiased investigation into the crash. and rory joins us from moscow and rory moscow very much on the defensive here, many are blaming russia for this tragedy. >> reporter: yeah, we heard from sergei fedorov in the last few minutes, the russian foreign minister who responded probably to those comments you just heard and also the other accusations coming out of kiev that it was

russia that was responsible in some way for this disaster. and what sergei fedorov said it was a long time and don't remember the last time he had a truthful word coming from the ukrainian government. we are also starting to get a more coordinated information response from the russian government. earlier on it was just sympathy with the victims and sympathy with bereaved families. now they are going on the offensive and we are hearing from the defense ministry here which is saying this, they have picked up signals from ukrainian book radar systems that were operated in the area of this crash yesterday and they are saying essentially the missiles that were fired could have come from two different places. they picked up an actual launch of missiles but they are saying

they detected the traces of radar systems from book batteries operated by the ukraine army in the area at that time so clearly they are trying to point the finger firmly at ukraine for the disaster. >> we will hear claim and counterclaim for a long time until the investigation concludes on that. to that enthe analysis of the black box or flight recorders will be very important, some speculation they are on their way to moscow. >> reporter: yeah, as scott was saying just then, there is some confusion about what is happening with these black box recorders, where are they? we don't really know to be sure because the separatists who control the area where scott is have been putting out different pieces of information and told him they have not found the black boxes but all over russian media the separatists have been saying that they have located at

least two recording devices and they are intending to pass those on to moscow. now, this of course is going to be a huge worry to international observers and to the malaysian government who are also calling for the crash scene to be left as untouched as possible. when those international investigators get to eastern ukraine and manage to start sifting through the wreckage they don't want anything to be missing, they don't want the black boxes to have been parcelled off to moscow and want to be able to get everything that was -- came down out of the sky as it was untouched and unmessed with and includes the bodies down here and i have been reading on russian media as well the pro-russian separatists say they are trying to move some of the bodies away from the crash zone to either donsk or karka

because the morgues in the area don't have facilities to cope with so many dead people. >> rory thanks for that in moscow. a diz disaster team has been se there and the air space over ukraine has been closed. >> u.s. and ukraine have indicated that malaysian airline flight 17 was shot down. should we be concerned it will be under international law and be against human dignity. malaysian condemn any such action in the strongest possible terms and call for those responsible to be swiftly brought to justice. 15 or 16 airlines in association with asia pacific airline fly this route over ukraine. european airlines also use the

same route and travel the same. in the hours before the incident, a number of passengers traveled from different carriers and use the same route. >> we are joined from the airport from kuala lumpur, the plane's intended destination and talking about how other airlines use the same route but a lot of airlines started avoiding ukrainian air space because of this and there are questions as to why malaysia airlines didn't. >> reporter: that is right, malaysian administer came under fire in the press conference and he was firing back saying 15 out of 16 airlines in asia take the route through ukraine and as international civil aviation authorities approve the route and at the same time we know as early as april of this year the government of the u.s. and the uk began warning its carriers to avoid the air space in certain

parts of ukraine that are deemed a threat to civilian airlines because of the possibility thought it could be shot down by rebel forces or other forces and the question then goes to the malaysian government and despite having it cleared by international authorities malaysia is under a great deal of pressure because this is the second airline disaster to hit the malaysian airlines national carrier in the last four months. in march of this year mh 370, a flight bound beijing disappeared to the days and they are scoring the oceans in asia looking for the plane as well as the 239 passengers. there has been a lot of criticism levied to malaysian airlines and the government for mishandling the investigation into flights mh 370 so this time around with mh 17 the malaysian government is under pressure to show it can be a trusted government when it comes to

international investigations like this. we heard from the prime minister earlier today saying he called on all international help from other world leaders to ensure that his investigation team as well as search and rescue teams can get to the crash site unfettered so a proper investigation can be had. over the last few hours at the kuala lumpur airport the government dispatched csi, forensic expert to help identify the body to a lot of military medics and search teams and it's an open question at this point if they will be able to do anything at the crash site considering the fact it is in rebel-held territory. >> steve, thank you very much indeed for that, steve is live from the international airport in kuala lumpur there. most of the people died in the crash were from the netherlands and still to come we will be live from amsterdam airport with the latest reaction. stay with us.

♪ welcome back, i'm julie and you are watching the al jazeera news hour, reminder of our top stories, israeli troops invaded gaza, at least 24 people have been killed since the offensive began after ten days of air strikes and shelling of the palestinian territory and they tried to stop firing rockets from gaza and benjamin netanyahu has announced the scope of the offensive in gaza will widen. pro-russian separatists in ukraine say they will agree to a cease fire to allow access to the crash site of the malaysian

airliner apparently shot down in the east. all 291 or 298 passengers on board were killed when the plane went down if an area controlled by the rebels. let's have more on that story now, advisor to ukraine's interior ministry says malaysian jet was brought down by a book missile system and russia and ukraine have them and each book has four missiles and mounted on a vehicle so it can be moved around quickly and uses radar to find a target, once a missile is fired it can reach 30 kilometers and three times the cruise altitude for airliners. joining us is bret a former officer for the royal australian airforce and good to have you on the program. i mean, it seems pretty accepted this plane was brought down by a missile. presumably that can be confirmed

by investigation of the wreckage. >> i think that's right. and over the day we are seeing, from when i woke up this morning, which i guess is 14 or 15 hours ago some doubt about that as the day has unfolded and we are seeing governments around the world be progressively more certain that it was a missile that brought the airplane down and assuming that we can have a proper crash investigation and i can't think of why that won't happen, there will be pretty clear evidence of the sort of missile, whether or not we will be able to definitely say from the forensic analysis that it was the ukrainian or missile in the hands of the rebels or russian missile i think that would be very difficult because i suspect many of these paths will have come from very similar factories if not the same factories as these were

manufactured over the years. >> indeed, russian defense minister is now saying they picked up radar activity from a ukrainian-controlled book missile system on the day of the tragedy, how important is information like radar and other monitoring equipment, how important is that going to be in determining what happened. >> i think it's going to be very important. obviously the united states and indeed i notice there is in the los angeles times about how american satellite systems would have been used to inform the united states and its allies about the sort of activities that were going on. the electronic emissions that both the control radars as well as in the actual missile intermitts as well as it starts to lock on to the target itself, those emissions can be detected both from a ground-based system and also from satellites but this is all collected and

analyzed and it has a special name called measurement and signals intelligence and over the day i'm sure that a lot of sifting and analysis has gone on in comparing notes if you like from lots of what has been collected over the last few hours to try to make sense of this. now whether or not the americans and other allies and what they collected is finally related to that which russia collects, that is yet to be seen. but one may hope that is the case so we can get to the bottom of this and make sure it never happens again. >> indeed, from a security point of view, you know, we have reports that both sides managing to bring down transport planes, fighter jets, all the rest of it, why was a civilian plane even allowed to fly over a conflict zone, why hadn't the air space been closed well

before that? >> well, the air space, as i understand it, up to 32000 feet was closed, in other words, global civil aviation authorities had basically warned or advised civil aircraft not to fly below 32000 feet which is essentially the altitude plus safety margin for a service and soldier fire surs for for missiles and the missiles used to bring down the planes in the conflict to date. at a high level you can use a much more sophisticated and medium altitude surface to a missile such as the one that seemed to have been used in this case. i guess that that was not anticipated by the authorities who regulate global safety with regard to civil aviation but i should emphasize that ultimately the decision about whether a

civil air operator flies a route, any route, is down to the risk of the operator, the risk of the operators are prepared to accept and they ultimately determine that, nobody. >> well, as you say, as time goes on we will get more information about this, bret, thank you very much indeed for speaking with us, interesting stuff and bret is in cameron, australia. tributes are flowing in for the 298 victims of the crash. the flight began in the netherlands and most of the passengers were dutch. flowers laid in the u ukrainian capitol and we are live from the airport in amsterdam and clearly this is something that has hit the neverer lands hard, a lot of international tribute pouring in from around the world and

international leaders saying that an investigation is necessary to find out what happened. >> yes, that is very much the case. 173 dutch nationals are believed to have died in this crash. it's a huge blow for the country as it is also for all of the other countries that have been involved in this disaster. the mood has shifted somewhat from shock and disbelief as was the case on thursday when news first surfaced about this crash in eastern ukraine to a mood now of anger and outrage. there have been some really strong words coming from leaders across the entire continent and angela merkel and the political solution in ukraine. it's germany belief and together

with the united states and other countries that this plane was indeed shot out of the sky with a surface to air missile. merkel is now calling for those who are guilty of downing this plane to be brought to justice. she is also insisted a cease fire be put into action immediately to allow for, in her words, a rapid investigation, that is perhaps the most important thing that the friends and family of those people who have been killed in this incident really need right now. they are looking for facts very few bits of information are actually being shared with them because right now very little is known about what happened. the fear is that perhaps crucial time has been lost perhaps the right level of investigation has not been carried out there in eastern ukraine. it's a difficult part of the world, disputed territory although experts are said to be on their way over there, the

worry is the facts maybe lost as the political wranglig regarding kiev. >> thank you for that. 27 australians were on board the flight and australian foreign minister is asking for full international support to investigate the cause of the crash. >> i asked russia give unqualified support for a full, thorough investigation to the downing of the flight and ask the united security council resolutions to facilitate such an investigation. >> and we go to dan of australia's nine television networks and said the crash had

an impact on the whole country. >> this morning the prime minister used diplomatic words when news of this which was around 12 hours ago now in australia but the rhetoric has hardened throughout the day and now it's a very blunt warning to russia, accept some responsibility for this and allow a fully transparent international investigation or prepare to be shunned by the international community. one of his direct quotes is i stress this is not an accident. it is a crime and criminals should not be allowed to get away with what they have done. australia is not usually in the business of picking fights especially with a country like russia but they say the initial response from the russian ambassador here which was to blame ukraine was, quote, deeply, deeply unsatisfactory. there is a g 20 meeting here later this year that president putin is scheduled to attend and i guess if he is even welcome

will really depend how russia responds over the coming days. >> there were a couple dozen australians on board and a lot of the passengers were on their way to an aides conference in australia. so what kind of public reaction have you seen to this tragedy? >> surely it's had a huge impact. this is the worst aviation disaster that australia has ever been effected by and the death toll is creeping up in the high 20s, among them a grandfather traveling with three of his young grandchildren aged 8, 10 and 12. there was also a family who has now been hit by both malaysia airline tragedies this year and still mourning their son and wife that was on mh 370 that disappeared in march and grieving another one with a step daughter killed on mh 17 and you could not believe it really and having a huge impact only the entire country. >> a little earlier on i spoke

with a man in moscow who is a former russian diplomate and he blames the crash solely with ukraine. >> so i think we cannot believe what is said in kiev because kiev is on our opinion is in full responsibility for what happened. and shut downs by ukrainian air defense systems. >> okay. >> because book m 1 is only responsible and it can launch their octobers -- rockets on 120 kilometers. >> putin has been speaking to mark rooter and putin called for an impartial investigation, do you think that can be achieved given the political sensitivities in that area? >> of course. russia may be and was one of the first countries who insisted on

international investigation, not russian, because oppositional forces suggest that russia could take the black boxes but russia refused to take it and said that they should be in responsibility of investigation. russia is ready to participate actively but we don't believe the american side or ukrainian authority that is discovered by american government can give a good result. >> let's speak to james base, al jazeera's diplomatic editor and is live from london and james we have heard, you know, throughout the past few hours every side blaming the other side, does anyone know what really happened. >> i have been speaking to experts, diplomates and officials over the last few hours and i can tell you quite a few people are telling me they believe it's possibly that the

pentagon might already know what happened because they have very sophisticated spy satellites as you know in other facilities but this is an area where it happened with eyes on the area and watching that border and wanted to see what military hardware was crossing that border so it's quite possible that they may have intelligence information that actually shows what happens and i think we would need to watch very closely an announcement that could come from the pentagon and no word from the pentagon because it's still very early in the morning in the u.s., but if there was to be an announcement from the u.s. and if someone makes an announcement of culpability then i think absolutely everything changes here and we move into a very different political area with regard to this tragedy. of course if they can't workout from the spy satellites what happened then it will lie very much on that accident investigation, crash investigation on the ground, which itself is going do be very

challenging. >> so, james, what is going to happen with any investigation? how is that going to proceed? >> reporter: well, let me tell you what normally happens, and this is a precedent fr overy many years, when a plane comes down and there is a crash, it is the responsibility of the sovereign nation to investigate that crash, the country where it crashed. the problem in this case is it crashed in ukraine territory but whether ukrainian authorities don't have access and controlled by the separatists and they is why you hear calls for international-led investigation and i think it will be interesting to watch what happens in the u.n. security council in about 3 1/2 hours from now because that's when it's likely they may well talk about how that international investigation could be carried out. there is a part of the united nations called iko, the

international civil organization and not many of us heard of it but in the coming hours you may hear a lot more about it because officials tell me they think it's likely they could be the body that is given the job to coordinate all of this. although one senior western military official i spoke to said it can be a normal investigation and has to be military investigators involved because of the nature, what happens to have happened here. of course the other complication is the fact that this is not been kept a sterile area, people tramped all over the area and the two flight recorder, the so called black boxes and are orange rather than blacked seem to be removed from the places they were originally found. that is a complicating factor. another one is access to this area, will the separatists let everyone who wants to come in, for example, western military observers, whether they allow them to get to this area that they hold.

>> james, thanks for that update and james is in london there. let's get the weather with everton now and everton that typhoon is gathering strength and is it causing problems? >> it certainly is. this is right up there among one of the strongest storms ever to hit the southwest corner of china and look at the picture and you can clearly see how well organized the system is and as it is swirling away there, picking up heat and moisture from the south china seas it really has its act together. at point of impact with the far northeast here we were looking at sustained winds of 250 kilometers an hour and that takes it up as a category five hurricane and really is something of a beast. and those very strong winds running to the southwest corner of mainland china and run across the far north of vietnam. of course it will weaken smartly as it makes its way across the

land and still talking huge amounts of rainfall and the damaging winds with us for the next 6-12 hours at the very least. this area, the southwest of china and we will see 300 millimeters of rain in parts and see how well organized the system is and it will continue pushing in a general northwest direction in the next couple days or so. we will see very heavy rain making its way across the good parts of china and further heavy rain also effecting the northeast of india. >> everton thanks indeed for that. we will have a round up of the day's other big stories straight after the break, do stay with us. ♪

♪ you are with the al jazeera news hour, reminder of our top sto stori stories, israeli troops invaded gaza and 24 people are killed after ten days of air strikes and shelling in the territory and they tried to stop them firing rockets in gaza and benjamin netanyahu announced the scope of the offensive in gaza will widen. pro-russia separatists in ukraine say they will alto a cease fire to allow access to the crash site of the malaysia airliner apparently shot down in the east and 298 passengers were killed when the plane went down in the area controlled by the rebels. now victims of the conflict between farc rebels will be in

negotiations and this is the first time they meet with the group and put forward their own proposals and we have more. >> reporter: for the first time in a long history of the columbia conflict farc rebel also be face-to-face with victims in a joint statement, peace negotiators announced that at least five delegations of victims will travel to cuba starting on august 16 and will be able to voice their concerns and question their perpetrators, the columbia government and farc rebels for the first time admitted their role in human rights violations in this very long conflict. each delegation will be composed of 12 victims and chosen in an up coming national victims forum in the columbia city of cali and they are looking for compensation but mostly they want answers to their many questions, they want to know what really happened to their

tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of people that have been kidnapped, killed or simply have disappeared in the 50 years of this conflict at the hands of rebel groups, para militarys or even the countries armed forces. there is a lot of expectations in columbia for these meetings to start. the fact that the victims have been a sticking point for the negotiations means that this issue could probably bring finally peace to this country and now for the first time the voices of those who suffered are taking central stage. >> angry parents in india have protested outside of a school over the alleged rape of a six-year-old girl by two staff members and took them 12 days to report it to police. the girl is being treated in hospital. doctors in england and wales could soon be allowed to help

terminally ill patients to die, legislation before parliament could allow doctors to prescribe a lethal dose with people with less than six months to live and we report from london. >> reporter: margaret john is dying but determined to live life to the fullest and when she can no longer do all the things she loves she wants to be able to choose how and when she dies. >> for me it isn't about dying, it's about living to the full, to the very last moment and then saying life is no longer worth it for me because the things that really make my life worth living have gone. >> reporter: margaret is part of the 73% of england and whales that support a law to assist in dying for the terminally ill, a proposed law on the issue is having its second reading in the house of lords, britain's upper house. if it passed through all of the

political hurdles and became law, what would it mean? a patient would be terminally ill with less than six months to live, decision to die would have to be made of their own free will. two independent doctors would need to confirm the patient's state of health and also confirm the patient made an informed decision to die. only then would a doctor prescribe life-ending medication but the patient would take it at the time of their choosing. several countries have said no but few league liked it and the netherlands was the first to do so in 2002 and luxenberg legalized it in 2008 and switzerland is home to a world-famous clinic which helps the terminally ill commit suicide and gave terminally ill children the right to day and in the states four have legalized physician-assisted suicide and it's highly decisive issue

particularly those in the medical profession saying doctors are help to cure and not kill. the college of general practitioners says the bill would instigate a slippery slope and there by a matter of time before assisted dying would be extended to those who could not consent to the capacity and severely disabled. >> it's for people that are quite terminally ill and it's not about putting people out of the way and it's the right to information, the right to choice and not the right to force a doctor to do it for you because that would be intolerable too. you can't have somebody else be your executioner. >> reporter: she will fight for the right to die even though she is unlikely to see a new law in her lifetime. i'm with al jazeera in london. >> we have the day's docume developments on al jazeera.com and good-bye for now.

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>> the violence has continued just a couple of miles from here >> just a short while ago we heard a large air strike very close by... >> people here are worried that this already serious situation may escalate. >> for continuing coverage of the israeli - palestinian conflict, stay with al jazeera america your global news leader. >> this morning, an international investigation is underway after a passenger plane is shot down over ukraine, killing everyone onboard. now airlines around the world are scrambling to change their flight paths and american experts are stepping in to find out who's to blame. >> boots and tanks on the ground, thousands of