welcome to our special coverage of what's going on in gaza and the crash of flight mh17. welcome to our viewers in the united states this hours. we're live in london. another 74 coffins carrying the remains of those killed on malaysia airlines flight 17 are

scheduled to arrive in the netherlands today. family, friends and dignitaries were there. meanwhile the australian prime minister tony abbott says 50 national police officers have been sent to london in advance of them possibly joining an international team to secure the site of the mh17 crash in eastern ukraine. >> israel's air travel backlog may or may not clear up now that the u.s. airlines authority has been cleared to serve its main airport. american officials lifted the ban on ben-gurion hours ago, but are leaving it up to the individual airlines to decide whether to fly to tel aviv after a gaza rocket struck near the airport on tuesday. speaking of gaza, the health ministry there is now reporting 715 palestinians killed in more than two weeks of violence. 35 are dead on the israeli side.

most of them soldiers. diplomats are still trying to secure a ceasefire. the secretary of state john kerry remains in the region after meeting with israeli and palestinian leaders yesterday. leaders across the middle east and beyond are pushing for the ceasefire in the israel-hamas conflict. everyone has a stake, and hopes to have some influence. but the middle east is a different place today than it was just a few years ago. weeks ago, you could say, given how quickly things develop. a main obstacle is hamas to agree to certain terms. the main question, what will it take for both sides to stop fighting? ♪ >> reporter: hamas shows off his military muscle. >> a promotional video, boasting of its fighters, rockets and tunnels. israel's military releases footage of its destroying the enemy, a show of strength it and

much of the west considers a terrorist organization. both sides have a clear aim. to cripple or destroy the other. but it's a goal neither can currently achieve. so the question is, what will it take to silence the guns this time? hamas is clear about what it wants. their leader said wednesday, we want a ceasefire today, but israel must end the blockade now as a guarantee. then we can negotiate. israel withdrew troops from gaza in 2005, but has controlled gaza's water, airspace and most borders ever since, claiming they are protecting themselves against a more militarized hamas. human rights group have called gaza the world's largest open-air prison and say the blockade should be lifted. >> the israelis may have to ease their restrictions on imports and exports. hamas salaries may have to be paid, perhaps by the cuteries.

anything more, release of prisoners, or a complete end to both egyptian and israeli control of the border, strikes me frankly as a bridge too far. hamas's tunnel network has surprised many, its scope and sophistication. giving it immediate access to the civilian population. the israeli military referring to this new battleground as lower gaza. >> the terrorists are taking with them equipment not only to try to kill israelis, but also to kidnap israelis. they're taking tranquilizers, handcuffs, et cetera, so they can bring back some israelis as hostages. israel wants to destroy this network before pulling out a. it's suffered more military casualties in the past two

weeks, than in the previous five years. hamas and other groups have lost over 100 fighters. more than 30 israeli soldiers have been killed. however, more children than fighters have lost their lives so far in gaza, making calls for a ceasefire all the more urgent. >> to finally end this conflict, should i say this round of the conflict? to be a bit more cynical. israel may want to look back to its 2006 war with hezbollah and leban lebanon. let's remind our viewers how 2006 ended. it was a month-long war between hezbollah and israel. a united nations resolution was passed to demilitarize southern lebanon and establish a truce. it has stuck over the last eight years or so, pretty much. could a similar model be used

for gaza, do you think? >> i think the fact we're talking about this option as well, shows that all options are on the table for israel. and they're now even considering the possibility of going through the u.n. security council, obtaining a resolution on the -- along the lines of the 2006 war with lebanon. i don't think it's a realistic option at this stage, because the 2006 resolution, didn't really work for israel. israel wasn't, and is not, completely happy with that. >> right, they're not completely happy, because -- and i agree with you. i covered that war, in fact. hezbollah came out of 2006 strengthened politically. demilitarization in lebanon did not happen. so from the israeli perspective, and i know this idea is being floated around, but why would they sign up for something similar? >> exactly. didn't work in 2006, why would it work now? >> but what would work at this

stage? we heard from the hamas leader, we're going to consider a truce, but you have to look to a more permanent agreement, we have to discuss fundamental matters. >> i think there are three main options at this stage. the most likely one is that israel significantly degrades hamas military capabilities and withdraws and declares unilaterally a ceasefire, that's the first and most likely option at this stage. the second possibility, israel-hamas manage to find a third party, a broker that they both trust -- >> not egypt. egypt sounded good when the muslim brotherhood was in charge. but now you have a military leader and they don't trust him. >> that doesn't work for hamas, absolutely. >> so who could be the third party? >> hamas would like qatar to play that role. israel doesn't accept that. the u.s., but they don't seem to

have much leverage in the region, so it doesn't seem to be an option. russian, very unrealistic. >> russia has other things to worry about. what's option three? >> that israel manages to overthrow hamas. the question is, how would they do that? isn't this a risky strategy that would end up basically having -- with israel having a much more radical organization in control of the gaza strip. not necessarily the palestinian authority would be able to be reinstated and to rule on the gaza strip. >> how realistic is that? you have a political authority in the west bank, in ramallah versus a militant, armed militant group in gaza, how realistic is that? >> not realistics at all, considering the palestinian authority is not popular at all.

>> but you've given three options and after each one, you've said, but that doesn't sound like it's very realistic. are we basically saying here today at least that the ceasefire agreement, or anything that could stick, that has any permanence to it, is just not in the cards right now? >> this is a diplomatic stalemate. there's no question about this. i would say, of the three options right now, the most realistic one is a unilateral ceasefire by israel after weeks and weeks of fighting. >> okay, but if hamas keeps firing rockets, they're going to say, look, we disengaged. we stopped firing and they keep firing rockets at us. >> the key is, significantly degrading hamas military capabilities. but again, as i say, this would take weeks and weeks. >> five rockets were fired, our reporter was saying in jerusalem today. which is a lot less than other days. is it because hamas is holding back, or is it because they're been degraded? >> they have been degraded.

after already several days of fighting, it's quite clear that hamas is running out of military options to threaten israel. this is a fact at this stage. >> so maybe then there is that possibility out there, if that holds, this lessening in rocket activity and perhaps the bombing will stop as well in gaza. ricardo fabiany, pleasure talking to you. thanks very much for being on cnn. and our viewers in the u.s. the job of tending to the dead and wounded falls to the red cross who work in the war-torn streets. ben wedeman went along to observe the dangers those workers face. take a look. >> reporter: they came to look for the living and the dead, but had to turn back under fire.

as did we. >> sniper back there. >> reporter: the red cross and the palestinian red crescent entered the battered and embadged neighborhood. red cross veteran larry maybee cautiously confident they could do their job. >> until now, i'm relatively comfortable with the security situation. i expect it might get a bit more difficult as we progress down there way. >> reporter: israeli military has shelled this area almost around the clock for more than four days as part of its offensive against hamas. the rescue workers well aware they needed to tread carefully. >> obviously this is making them nervous. we don't want to make them nervous. >> reporter: some residents took advantage of their presence to retrieve possessions. my brother's house is gone, says this man. nobody there was a fighter.

and now we're homeless. ahmed fled before the fighting began. his house is now in ruins. do you see, he asks. they're hitting civilians. they didn't hit one of the fighters or any of their so-called military targets. look at what they did. they destroyed the houses, the street, and killed civilians. a fireman tells me, i've never seen destruction like this. they tried but failed to relieve either the living or the dead. the shooting, it's not clear from whom, was too intense. >> small arms fire is increasing in intensity and directed at us. i think the problem is there are too many people here. too many civilians. if it was just us, it might be different. so we're coming back.

there are two people trapped in rubble wounded. i want to try to go in on foot to get those two before we go back. >> did you find anybody? >> no. >> there's the front line there and there's a -- >> reporter: seems that given the risk with explosions up the street and perhaps sniper fire, the risk for the red cross and the palestinian red crescent are simply too much. they're now pulling out. ben wedeman, cnn, gaza. european leaders consider some new economic sanctions against russia. a look at what they may be doing just ahead. plus, spain's unemployment pain. the latest figures have just been released. they are just mind-boggling. we'll break them down for you.

>> it seems everywhere you look in the middle east, there is instability and there is violence. we're getting some news just in from iraq. reuters reporting a huge attack on a prisoner bus there. they say at least 60 people were killed in that one attack. they say suicide bombers and gunmen attacked a bus transferring convicts from a prison north of baghdad, leading

to clashes with the security forces. government officials say the dead include prisoners and police guarding them. this attack comes almost a year to the day after attacks on two iraqi prisons freed 500 inmates. back now to russia. european leaders are meeting in brussels once again today to consider more sanctions against moscow. but analysts don't expect any quick decisions. the eu is expected to add some russian companies to the list of existing sanctions today. we're not talking about sector-wide sanctions, but agreement on restricts access to europe's financial markets and technology could take longer. russia is the main supplier of natural gas to the european uni union. let's take a look at what the likely impact of the sanctions could be on russia. diana, i was speaking with some

russian business people. and what they were saying was, to me, was although this hasn't really had an economic impact on a large scale, that there's starting to be real discomfort at the notion that this will hurt them down the line. is that what you're hearing in russia? >> i think that's very much the case, yes. and even if the eu don't slap really hard phase three sanctions on today, it looks like they will do soon. simply because these sanctions don't look as if they're particularly deterring mr. putin from his course, however much they begin to hurt the economy in a more permanent way further down the line, with normal people feeling that they have less money in their pockets. all of it, in a way, contributes to a kind of siege mentality that is reinforcing this notion that mr. putin is defending

russia against an onslaught from the west, and it's a very difficult position for him to maneuver his way out of. that said, the polish finance minister believes that we will see very harsh sanctions put in place today. let's take a listen to what he said. >> translator: poland has a bigger trade volume with russia than germany does. i think bringing down the plane has to be the last straw. i expect the european commission upon come up with possible sanctions of level three. >> so you have a situation, hala, where the russian economy is heading towards a recession. sanctions look as if they're going to be placed on, if not today, in a really harsh fashion, at least someday soon. yet the narrative that the russian people understand, which

has been built-up around this conflict in ukraine is that mr. putin is defending the legitimate interests of russian-speaking people in eastern ukraine against western interference, against kiev, who is attacking its own people in a civil war. if he is to back down from that position, on which his popularity has been based, and he's now at over 80% in the approval ratings, you know, from all the analysts i've spoken to, they just don't see that happening. so it's very difficult to see what impact these sanctions will have, if not to push him into a corner and possibly reinforce his defiance. and that is perhaps why nato, and american intelligence is pointing to the fact that russia has not taken away troops from the border. it's done the opposite. they believe over the last few weeks, there are some 12,000 troops back on russia's border with ukraine. and that the flow of weapons

going into ukraine since the crash of mh17 has actually gone up, hala. >> okay, diana magnay live in moscow. no deescalation there. when we return, a boost for spain's economic recovery. we'll tell you about the country's latest job pictures when we come back. q.

it's a measure of how bad the economic picture is in spain, that when you're jobless rate is 24.5%, that's considered not a bad number. because that's down from 25.9% in the previous quarter. 24.5% is from april to june. just a day earlier, the bank of spain announced stronger second quarter gdp growth of about half a percent. all of this pointing to a slow, but, you know, at least look at it on the bright side, a continuing recovery in the eurozone's fourth largest economy. facebook shares surged in after-hours trading. and they are poised to open at an all-time high today after a strong quarterly earnings report. ad shares were higher than analysts had forecast.

we're all checking facebook on our phones. facebook stock will open at more than $75 a share. valuing the company at $190 billion. that is similar to ibm. now, as we told you earlier, weather may have played a role in the crash of a transasia flight on wednesday. so, we don't know what caused the crash, obviously. but the weather was terrible. >> yeah, when you look at the weather conditions, hala, it's remarkable to think that a plane was allowed to fly in such conditions. of course you would assume that if weather was an issue, trapers they didn't see the storms that developed ahead of the aircraft. this was category two tuesday into wednesday morning. winds again, 160, 150 kilometers per hour, about 100 miles per

hour on the initial landfall. wednesday afternoon, 3:30 in the afternoon, the secondary landfall for portions of eastern china. two hours after that landfall, we had an aircraft that was allowed to fly towards the island of penghu. this is the island here. two hours after the storm had moved on into portions of china. so you would think conditions would begin to improve. but when you pull up the radar images from those hours, you see storms developing behind the storm. what we call what is taking place is training. like box cars on a train. you get a line of thunderstorms that develop one after another. that's precisely what moved over penghu during the time of this crash. you pull up the data from the closest weather stations, winds 60 kilometers per hour, 40 miles per hour, visibility one mile, rainfall four inches in just three hours. so far from ideal when it comes

to flying conditions. we know the pilot tried to make an initial landing, asked if he could go around and come back a second time. it's the second attempt when the crash occurred. video after the storm made landfall showing you what we're talking about with powerful winds and heavy rainfall. this is down at the surface. when you get up a few hundred meters in the atmosphere, less friction aloft, winds are stronger and that's something investigators are looking at carefully right now with regards to this crash in taiwan. >> okay, thank you very much. >> you bet. live in london, i'm hala gorani. thanks for watching our special coverage of mh17 and what's going on in gaza. our coverage continues now on cnn and cnn international with "early start." stay with us.

good morning, everyone. breaking news to tell you about this morning. u.s. flights to and from tel-aviv clear to resume. the faa clearing the travel ban. it lasted just 36 hours. it's up to u.s. carriers to decide what they will do. we'll go live with the latest on the ground. new developments on who shot down malaysia flight 17. did pro-russian separatists possess the weapons to shoot the plane down? this, as emotional, emotional tributla