00:00 to our senior reporter Catherine Norris Trent standing by in Tel Aviv. Hello to you Catherine.
00:04 What more can you tell us? The IDF is around Gaza. It seems that this conflict increasingly
00:10 turning to urban and underground warfare. Hello there Will. Yes, that is correct. The
00:20 Israeli army says that it has surrounded Gaza City and that it continued operations overnight
00:26 and this morning supported by the Israeli air force and from missile ships stationed off Gaza
00:34 in the Mediterranean there. So as this conflict goes on they are looking to push forward further
00:41 into Gaza City. According to their reports the international press are not allowed inside Gaza
00:47 which is sealed off to journalists from the outside to verify those reports. But they will
00:53 be now looking to push ahead inside that very dense urban area. A lot of civilian population
01:01 remains there but it is also going to be the theatre of very tough urban warfare. Lots of
01:09 densely packed streets with buildings, alleyways, of course Hamas has its tunnel networks under the
01:15 city so this is likely to be a very bloody next stage of the fighting both for the Israeli forces
01:23 who have been counting casualties and of course Hamas fighters and for people in Gaza. More
01:29 air strikes reported on residential areas of Gaza both in the north there around the Gaza City area
01:37 and in the south around Hanounis. It seems that the Israeli forces there have effectively cut off
01:43 the north of the Gaza Strip from the south there so that raises even more questions about how to
01:49 get aid into areas where it is most needed. And of course the Israeli authorities have been telling
01:57 civilians to get out of the north of the Gaza Strip which they have declared a war zone but
02:02 the UN in Gaza has been saying there is no safe place inside Gaza and it is getting increasingly
02:09 difficult for civilians there to shelter and even to flee south as this offensive presses on.
02:16 And Catherine that's making all the more disconcerting this next bit of news reports
02:20 that Israel has begun sending Palestinian workers in Israel back to Gaza. What more can you tell us
02:26 about that?
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