john donnison joining us live from jerusalem. have talked about, hearing from the israeli prime minister, sang his troops are at the height of battle, and circling gaza city. but what does that mean and what could happen next? we have a former commanding officer who served in the british army in afghanistan. i spoke to him earlier and he gave his assessments of those operations as those troops advanced to the outskirts of gaza city. >> a very challenging thing for the defense force. what they are trying to do now is to cut off gaza city completely to prevent the escape of terrorists and provide a base from which they will then attack into the city, and they will have a number of targets identified within gaza city, which are key hamas control and command points and hamas infrastructure, and locations where hamas leaders are located. and they will then progressively attempt to deal with each of those locations by ground forces salt. --ground force assault. it will be very close terrain. they will be focused on trying to move along

let's get the latest from john donnison. that is a real point here.ve seen some of the fallout of those israeli airstrikes, and once again international pressure on israel to minimize harm to civilians. that is the focus of diplomatic talks. >> it is, and similar comments -- we heard in an interview with president herzog on the bbc. when we look forward to tomorrow -- today for a tiny fraction of the palestinian population in gaza, there has been a glimmer of light. those people who have managed to get out. i think we will see you tomorrow continued efforts to get more foreign nationals out of gaza, more of the most critically injured. we have seen those pictures today of people scrolling down the lists at the rafah crossing, looking to see if their name is on there. and tomorrow, we are going to e the same thing. narrator: funding for this presentation of this program is provided by... narrator: financial services firm, raymond james. man: bdo. accountants and advisors. narrator: funding was also provided by, the freeman foundation. and by judy and p

john donnison, bbc news, in the west bank. of gaza here in the west bank. now, the strange story amid the ongoing crisis of two british nationals and two dependents of british citizens claiming they've been sent back to gaza after escaping the territory on monday. they say that family members were able to travel onto cairo, but they were not on a list for entry to egypt. yogita limaye has that story. 72 hours out of hell... ..then back in it. these british citizens were let out of gaza, but now they've been sent back in. he did the passport... abdalrahman alharazin, an interpreter. his name wasn't on a list of evacuees, but his family's was. his wife is heavily pregnant, and he has three young children, so abdalrahman was allowed to leave. i spoke to him over the phone from jerusalem. he says the uk government didn't act in time. i was expecting someone to help, someone to help me and my kids, who are in tears, and my wife, who needs hospital. i thought someone would really look at us with mercy. ahmed sabra is a british docto

bbc correspondent john donnison works on the israeli border.here are undoubtedly worried and scared, there is tension here, the border is only 10 km from here, many towns and villages located close to the border have been evacuated. the israeli forces have accumulated many of their forces. in the last few hours we have heard a sound, similar to the exit of an artillery volley, from the side of israel hunted. but now none. we did not see a response from the lebanese side. since the beginning of the gaza war, hezbollah's response has been relatively moderate. however, the violence that has taken place on this border in recent weeks has been perhaps the worst we have seen since the 2006 war between israel and lebanon. and it used to be enough to start another war. but hezbollah is a force much more powerful than hamas. they have approximately 150,000 missiles, and some of them are capable of reaching different parts of israel. hezbollah fighters are much better trained than hamas, many of them having fought in syria. prime minister benjamin netany

john donnison, bbc news, in the west bank.t the war in gaza are becoming a sensitive issue. pro—palestinian protesters are due to hold one on saturday, which is also armistice day, when there are formal events to mark the anniversary of the end of the first world war. prime minister rishi sunak has described the march as disrespectful. today, he met the head of the metropolitan police and asked for assurances that remembrance events will be safeguarded. here's chris mason. for the last four saturdays, parts of central london have looked like this. but this saturday is armistice day and so a question, should a march go ahead on a day of commemoration? the metropolitan police say they would only request the government banned it if there was a threat of serious disorder but they say there isn't, as things stand. the prime minister says he isn't happy about it. this is a decision that the metropolitan police commissioner has made, and he has said that he can ensure that we safeguard remembrance for the country this weekend as well

john donnison, bbc news, in the west bank. the war in gaza there on the west bank. now, a strange story amid the ongoing crisis, with two british nationals and two dependents of british citizens claiming they've been sent back to gaza after escaping the territory on monday. they claim that family members were able to travel on to cairo, but they were not on a list for entry to egypt. yogita limaye has that story. 72 hours out of hell. then, back in it. these british citizens were let out of gaza, but now they've been sent back in. he did the passport... abdulrahman al—harazi, an interpreter. his name wasn't on a list of evacuees, but his family's was. his wife is heavily pregnant, and he has three young children, so abdulrahman was allowed to leave. i spoke to him over the phone from jerusalem. he says the uk government didn't act in time. i was expecting someone to help, someone to help me and my kids, who are in tears, and my wife, who needs hospital. i thought someone would really look at us with mercy. ahmed sabri is a bri

moment, we'll talk to our gaza correspondent rushdi aboualouf, and our correspondent injerusalem, john donnisonande knell reports. the exodus continues, on foot, with donkeys or using their last drops of fuel, gazans from the north are arriving in the south of the strip again today after israel's military opened up the road. exposure magga israel's fire power is on display in the very north. while gun battles are still rage, it says it is making progress in its mission to depose hamas but the islamist group has already lost control here. the bbc was among the media giving a close—up view of the fighting behind israeli lines. it is close-up view of the fighting behind israeli lines.— israeli lines. it is not an operation. _ israeli lines. it is not an operation, it's - israeli lines. it is not an operation, it's a - israeli lines. it is not an operation, it's a war. i israeli lines. it is not an| operation, it's a war. it's israeli lines. it is not an - operation, it's a war. it's going to last time, it will take us time. until hamas no longer exists. at last time, it will take us time. until ha

john donnison, bbc news, in central israel. 0ur our thanks for talking to our correspondence.s. there are british and us citizens amongst them and this is the scene at the rafah crossing and we understand that this is when they leave, this is the southern border of gaza, and there are field hospitals nearby. 0fficial numbers say the 335 foreign passport holders, 76 injured people from gaza have been able to leave so far and “p have been able to leave so far and up until now that crossing was only open to allow a limited number of aid, humanitarian aid via lorries each day. unicef is one of the aid agencies providing medical equipment and supplies to those treating the injured who have crossed into egypt. toby frickerfrom unicefjoins us now. good morning to you, toby. we are looking at the images from the board itself and we understand it might open again today. tell us about the work you are able to do the people who have crossed. thank you. firstly, let me say unicef obviously welcomes the opening of the border particularly for these urgent medical cases, especially children.

donnison, bbc news, jerusalem. a short while ago i spoke about secretary blinken's visit with john altmann...ving as director of the middle east programme at the centre for strategic and international studies. welcome to you, jon. thanks so much for being with us. i want to begin with what we have seen from president biden. he was asked about a humanitarian pause. he gave a thumbs up. do you think that we could potentially see humanitarian pauses for civilians in gaza anytime soon? i think we'll see some sort of a pause. with all these israeli hostilities with hamas, there is often something short of a ceasefire but with some sort of delimiting of free passage for people, of an ability to get relief then, i think we will see something but it is much less than the arab governments were asking for today. i think it is likely to be much less than the us government was asking the israelis for. that's interesting. much less than you think the administration was asking the israelis for. is there any gap there between the two? do you think their positions are widening? what sort of conversations do