Gaza's Rafah border crossing with Egypt to reopen

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00:00The reopening of the Rafah crossing would be an extremely significant move and it comes after

00:04pressure from the European Union, the World Health Organization and the United Nations.

00:09Antonio Guterres is actually getting involved in this discussion as well, saying that there

00:14are some 2,500 children in the Gaza Strip who are in urgent need of medical evacuation because they

00:22are at risk of imminent death. So the situation then would be a reopening of the Rafah crossing

00:27on a temporary basis in order to allow for medical evacuations from the Gaza Strip.

00:32Now that is something that we understand is ongoing and it's going to happen imminently,

00:37so obviously we're looking for developments there. On the other side of the Rafah crossing,

00:42meanwhile, just to sort of give you the context, Rafah in the south of the Gaza Strip

00:46bordering Egypt. On the Egyptian side of the crossing there's been a demonstration

00:51throughout the morning regarding Donald Trump's plan to relocate people from Gaza to other

00:57countries and one of the countries he named was Egypt. This has been widely condemned by all the

01:02countries that Trump has mentioned as possible destinations for the people of the Gaza Strip,

01:08basically moving them out and putting them in places such as Egypt, Jordan. Trump is saying

01:13that that is something that he would like to see happen. Hamas is saying this would be a

01:16forced repatriation. They talk about it being effectively a war crime. The situation, of course,

01:21within the Gaza Strip, there is huge devastation due to Israel's bombardment since October the 7th,

01:272023. For instance, all the families moving back to the north of Gaza to try to refine their

01:34communities and their homes will just move into basically square kilometers of rubble.

01:39Desperate need of humanitarian aid there. We have news on that one too. The United Nations

01:44Relief and Works Agency, which was set up in 1949 to care for Palestinian refugees,

01:51was forcibly closed by an Israeli law just yesterday. UNRWA will continue to provide

01:57humanitarian aid as best it possibly can and it is needed so much in the north of Gaza. 130,000

02:03tents, for instance, are needed in the 33 makeshift camps that have been set up there to help people

02:08who are currently sleeping among the rubble. The hostages released or to be released on Saturday,

02:14you've been dealing with that one already. 90 Palestinian prisoners will be coming the other

02:18way. The equation works out for every civilian hostage, 30 Palestinian prisoners will be

02:23released and we're working on that, of course, as that happens and evolves throughout Saturday.

02:28I have some news of the situation to the north of Israel in Lebanon. Israeli

02:34airstrikes taking place earlier on the Beqa Valley around Baalbek. Two men were killed

02:41in that at least. Ten are reported to have been taken to hospital with their injuries.

02:46The ceasefire there, which was agreed back in November, looking increasingly fragile. There

02:51was a 60-day deadline which has expired now for Israel to retreat to the border. That isn't

02:57happening and, of course, the situation is one we're monitoring very, very closely indeed. We

03:02understand too that Benjamin Netanyahu is having a meeting of his security cabinet so we're looking

03:07for a reaction for that too.

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