the operations in the south will be conducted "with no less strength" than in the north. hospitals inside gaza are struggling to take in the casualties with un officials describing a "degree of panic" in medicalfacilities that hasn't been seen before. an adviser to prime minister benjamin netanyahu told the bbc that israel was making the "maximum effort" to avoid killing civilians. israel has been dropping leaflets with maps, showing gazans the areas that it plans to strike. our diplomatic correspondent paul adams explains why that often isn't protecting civilians. this has been a problem throughout the past two months. israel believes and says that it is giving as much notice as it is giving as much notice as it possibly can to the civilian population to leave certain areas where the fighting is most concentrated. and they believe that these new maps with this detailed grid, numbered grid should help that process because they are saying to people in certain numbered areas, these are the areas you have leave. the trouble is people don't know where they should leave to. and it is also the case that even though israel may be concentrating on one particular set of areas, they are also hitting targets elsewhere. our correspondence paul adams reporting there. as fighting continues in gaza, tensions have also been rising in the west bank, a territory home to more than 3 million palestinians. there has been an increased presence of israel's military as well as jewish settlements there. those settlements are viewed as illegal under international law, though that is something that israel disputes. our international editor jeremy bowen brings us this report on gaza and the situation in the west bank. and a warning — it does contain images that you may find distressing. lost boys, brothers looking for their father — "my dad's been killed. i swear my dad's been killed." they're lost in the mighty vengeance promised by israel. then they found their father and brother were dead. the strike, filmed by a freelance journalist, destroyed the home of this family in northern gaza. these are the latest israeli army pictures. they're pushing forward into southern gaza. the american defence secretary says he's warned israel repeatedly that if its troops don't stop killing so many palestinians, they will drive civilians into the arms of hamas, turning a tactical victory into a strategic defeat. in khan younis, civilian casualties are overwhelming the hospital. israel insists civilians are getting warnings and time to get to designated safe areas. a un official on the spot says that's not happening. everything's broken down, the war on children has resumed, and with a ferocity, at least here in southern gaza, that has not been seen before during this war. another narrative that is so dangerous, this idea of... "what happened in the north will not be "allowed to happen in the south." well, i can bear witness to it happening. on the west bank, this village was mourning ahmed. local people said he was killed last night by armed israelis from a nearbyjewish settlement. palestinians said jewish settlers entered the village late on saturday afternoon, protected by the israeli army. settlers, they said, opened fire when local men rushed to stop them burning cars and a house. shouting it was dark by the time they found the body of ahmed. they prepared the father of six for burial. attacks byjewish settlers on palestinians are repeatedly condemned by the americans, british and other allies of israel. around noon, after the funeral, the men of the village paid their respects to ahmed asi's family. settler violence against palestinians has risen sharply since hamas attacked on october 7. it is rarely prosecuted. among the mourners was the dead man's eldest son, nour. the settlers are violently opposed to a palestinian state alongside israel, and they have powerful allies in the israeli government. "the lack of security has helped "them act like this," say offman, ahmed's brother. "the army are protecting them, not stopping them, "but the future will be good as god promised us. "this land is ours, this country is ours," he said. one thing that's come out very strongly in the last couple of days of talking to palestinians in the west bank — something has changed since october 7. the settlers are more aggressive, they're better armed and they're pushing harder. the increase in violence is a direct result of the gaza war, making international protests that the settlements are illegal even less important to those who believe god gave this land to thejews. you speak a lot about the law, the law, ok, the international law. it does not exist here, because arabs, all the time, break the international law. what about all these videos of young men, settlers with guns, intimidating palestinians? we're not happy to carry weapons. ok, i don't like weapons. but if we not carry weapons, the arabs destroy all the jewish people. after this war, the americans want an independent palestinian state alongside israel, to secure the future, but rising violence in the west bank shows that might be impossible. jeremy bowen, bbc news. we're following developing news out of indonesia. rescuers found the bodies of ii climbers after the marapi volcano erupted in west sumatra sunday. more are still missing. joining me live is hanna samosir from ourjakarta bureau. thank you for being with us. what more do we know about what happened here?— happened here? yes, thank you. so the indonesian _ happened here? yes, thank you. so the indonesian have - happened here? yes, thank you. so the indonesian have just - so the indonesian havejust confirmed the ii climbers were found dead today after the marapi volcano in western sumatra erupted yesterday. so a course —— according to certain rescue there were 75 climbers who were trapped when the mount marapi erupted and a total of 79... 49 of them were successfully evacuated on sunday evening. so now there are still 12 climbers who have not been found and the authorities raised the alert to the second highest level and prohibited residence from going within three kilometres of the crater. these eruptions itself was not presented by a significant increase in volcanic activity so it was only recorded three times between november 16 until the second of december. can between november 16 until the second of december.— second of december. can i ask ou. .. second of december. can i ask yom -- how — second of december. can i ask you... how active... _ second of december. can i ask you... how active... there - second of december. can i ask you... how active... there are j you... how active... there are many volcanoes in that region, around 130. ourfather many volcanoes in that region, around 130. our father usually assume a yes, the geography of indonesia is dominated by volcanoes.— indonesia is dominated by volcanoes. , ., , volcanoes. they are between -lates. volcanoes. they are between plates. indonesia _ volcanoes. they are between plates. indonesia has- volcanoes. they are between plates. indonesia has many l plates. indonesia has many volcanoes erupting in the year. we are used to these kind of eruptions. throughout the year. briefly, what more can you tell us about the region, very briefly? us about the region, very briefl ? , ., , briefly? yes, of course. indonesia _ briefly? yes, of course. indonesia is _ briefly? yes, of course. indonesia is dominated | briefly? yes, of course. i indonesia is dominated by volcanoes, there are many eruptions in a year, so indonesia in this year alone there are a lot of volcanoes eruption, and i think it is almost hundreds of them, yes. indonesia has more volcanoes. thank you so much for your reporting there, good to talk to you. venezuela ns have voted overwhelmingly to pass a controversial referendum establishing a new state in a disputed and oil rich part of the contested jungled region with neighbouring guyana, claiming it as venezuela's. the national electoral council, which is widely seen as loyal to president nicolas maduro, has announced 95% of voters backed the proposal, sunday's referendum was called by president maduro, who argues the territory was stolen from venezuela. the dispute flared up in 2015 after oil was discovered in the region's offshore waters, boosting guya na's economy. mr maduro's government has not explained the steps they will take to enforce the results. guyana's government considers the vote a step toward annexation, raising concerns of a wider military conflict. guyana's president has criticised the decision. i asked pascal fletcher with bbc monitoring what he makes of these results. not surprisingly, the government of president maduro is presenting this as a major victory and they have already put out these numbers of 95% and overendorsement of the five main questions, asking if they support venezuela's claim over the essequibo region, currently administered by guyana. so they are proclaiming it as a major victory. there is a celebration going on now involving president maduro and his wife. i think they will also hold it up as an example of national union and patriotism. but let's not forget what this is really about. i think many people basically see this referendum as about internal politics and relations with the united states. basically, regarding venezuela's campaign to try and have sanctions lifted. that is really what is happening behind the scenes with this. i don't think anybody really expects that venezuela will make any serious moves to sort of cross the border or send military forces into the region, although guyana has been warning about that and calling the venezuelan referendum war—like. but i don't think there is any real concern that will happen, but certainly this is seen by many countries in the region, neighbours, the uk, the us — not a very welcome development and not helpful at this moment. and has been any reaction this news? well, certainly, on the guyanan side, they have certainly noted reports the turnout was quite low and despite the declaration of victory by the maduro government, there have been a lot of reports from newsagencies, from people on the ground that the turnout was not that high and actually no long queues — not many long queues were seen at the voting centre. the venezuelan opposition is basically saying this was a failure, this was propaganda, nationalist manoeuvre and that it has failed. so this all feeds into the national politics, where the opposition is hoping to challenge president maduro in elections in 202a. they have a candidate elected in primaries, and basically, this referendum was seen as an effort to kind of divert attention from that, distract and divide the opposition with a nationalist theme. there will be a lot of debate as to whether it really succeeded and people will be seeing what exactly venezuela tries to do from now. thuogh i repeat — i do not think many people expect them to send troops over the frontier, but that won't mean that guyana and many countries won't be watching that frontier very closely. i'm sure they will, and we know that brazil for one has military reinforced its border there with more troops. but as you say, before we get to this stage, ijust wonder whether there could be more international reaction because as we know prior to this referendum there was already that warning from the international court ofjustice in the hague, in the netherlands, saying essentially to venezuela do not challenge the status quo. could we see some international reaction to try and counter this? well, venezuela already sort of chose to interpret that internation court ofjustice ruling on the friday in its own particular way. they celebrated it as a triumph, again that word, saying, well, it did not stop us, they did not say we could not go ahead with the referendum. but of course if you read the actual ruling, it does urge venezuela to refrain from doing anything that could change the status quo. since some of the questions in this referendum were really quite sort of concerning from the guyanan point of view, talking about declaring an actual state in that region, talking about giving nationality to its inhabitants there, talking about incorporating it onto the map as venezuelan territory, that could be seen as pushing, trying to change the status quo. they have held the referendum and had this result but i do not think they will be doing anything on the ground. i don't think many people expect them to actually send people over the border. we've got about 30 seconds left. to what extent do you think this was also about oil at a time when the venezuelan economy has been in dire straits? i think that was certainly a factor, this is the venezuelan claim over essequibo has been around for 150 years but what an irritated venezuela was guyana opened some licensing rounds, in the offshore area of the essequibo which extended to the offshore area, these were been taken up by us companies and even a chinese company, so that really irritated venezuela which is of course under us sanctions which have even affected its oil industry, so it does not like seeing its neighbour being able to have access to these resources. pascal fletcher, thank you so much for your reporting. around the world and across the uk, this is bbc news. snow and ice is causing considerable problems across parts of the uk. police in northwest england declared a major incident after hundreds of drivers were trapped in their cars in cumbria. more than 2,500 people were left without electricity. yunis mulla has more from the lake district. few have witnessed these scenes in recent years. motorists were stuck for hours on the m6. drivers were told to leave their cars and go to an emergency refuge. in the dark we ran into inaudible on his way to a family wedding, this man was stuck the 19 hours without food or water or he says help from emergency service. cumbria police declared this a major incident and at one stage around 7000 homes and businesses were without power. yellow weather warnings are in place for large parts of england, scotland and wales. you're live with bbc news. ukraine has launched an investigation after it accused russia of killing unarmed ukrainian prisoners of war. it's based on a video that ukraine says shows russian troops killing two ukrainian soldiers. the video has not been verified, and russia has not commented. our correspondent jessica parker has more. this video emerged on saturday, and a ukrainian soldier said it shows two men from his unit being shot by russian soldiers as those two men were surrendering. it is alleged to have happened near the village at step bay which is near the town where there has been fierce fighting in the region of donetsk. what this video appears to show is two men emerging from a dugout — the first comes out with his hands on his head. he lies down on the ground. a second man comes out of the dugout as well and lies down on the ground. the soldiers who have been staking out the position appear to open fire. the video is pretty graining and you can't really see what's going on in the surrounding area either. the ukrainian military say it is a ukrainian filmed media and the general prosecutor's office here has launched an investigation. russia has not commented but it has previously denied allegations of war crimes in this conflict. it comes as winter is closing in on ukraine and the war is inching closer to its two—year anniversary. nato secretaryjens stoltenberg has encouraged the west to "support ukraine in both good and bad times," adding a warning that they should "be prepared for bad news." meanwhile, inside russia, president vladimir putin announced an increase of troop, adding about 170,000 personnel in stages. that brings the total troop numbers to more than 1.3 million. to discuss russia's internal politics and president putin's strategy after two years of war, i spoke to angela stent from the brookings institution. angela, we are approaching the two—year mark in this war. global attention now is fixed on the middle east and people in russia will know that. and yet soldiers are still being sent to the front line and president putin only wants to increase troop numbers. is there a risk that could backfire? so president putin is determined as we move towards his re—election next year, that people in his country should believe that russia is in fact winning the war and what he has done is what they are going to do is recruit 170,000 new troops, largely from these poor regions of russia, they will offer them large sums of money, they will earn much more than they would earn if they found a job where they live. so, so far, the kremlin has managed this rather well. 18 months ago they had a major recruitment drive and that is when large numbers of young men leave the country for kurdistan, parts of central asia and the former soviet republics because they did not want to be mobilised. this time the incentives are somewhat different. and, of course they are recruiting prisoners as well. that is the current stage of the recruitment drive, you mention the presidential election which will take place in russia on 17 march, could we see a more full—scale mobilisation potentially after that date? that is quite possible. president putin is deliberately not doing that before the election, once he is re—elected, you could see a larger one, this is a war of attrition, at the moment largely a stalemate but he is determined to soldier on and assuming next year there will be less western support for ukraine and therefore it will be easier to achieve his goals although he has not completely clearly defined what those are. you say he is determined to soldier on, i wonder if you think he could potentially meet any resistance because we know that groups of mothers, wives of russian soldiers have been trying to organise a protest, that has been quashed by authorities the past week but it is interesting to see some organisations once again when there has been very little of that recently. mothers we know were a powerful force in the conflict in chechnya, what does that tell us if there is the possibility of more organisation? it tells us clearly the mothers organisations as you say they were much more successful and visible during the chechnya war and during the soviet — afghan war as well. that opposition is there, at least they want to know what has happened to their male relatives. but the system in russia has become so repressive, and people are arrested on the slightest whim for questioning what is going on in the so—called special military operation, you are not going to see more of it because it will be squashed before it happens. something else i want to touch on, more domestic policy from president putin, we have seen the top court in russia declaring the lgbtqi movement an extremist movement, we have seen raids in gay clubs and president putin calling on women in the country to have more children, up to eight children to replenish the population. to this younger population in russia which has been used to a more open society, where does that leave them? well, it leaves them in a very bad position. first of all, to say the international lgbtq movement is an extremist organisation, there is no such thing, there are obviously organisations in different countries representing their interests, but this is very vague and gives president putin an excuse and the other people in the kremlin to just clamp down. so i think this is very worrying for members of that community in the russian federation as you said, there have been raids already on different clubs and bars, there have been jailings. but this combined with demonisation of feminism and saying women should not get higher education and they should start having babies at the age of 20 and continue having them as long as they can, this is returning to such a patriarchal society. there has always been elements of that there and the persecution of the lgbt community did not begin this year but he has just taken it to a much more extreme position and i doubt this is going to appeal to 18— to 30—year—olds who he wants to come and vote for him next march. in wales, what was thought to be a garden ornament has turned out to be a 100—year—old missile. david grundy has more. this all started on wednesday evening, sian and jeffrey edwards were at home a police officer who evening, sian and jeffrey edwards were at home a police officer who was evening, sian and jeffrey edwards were at home a police officer who was walking evening, sian and jeffrey edwards were at home a police officer who was walking past happen to spot staying in the garden decided he did not like the look of it so he knocked on the look of it so he knocked on the door and told them he would have to alert the ministry of defence, an hour later they were told the bomb squad would be there in the morning to get rid of them. i talked to geoffrey on the phone. he said he did not have time for me to go and seen today because they are too busy putting up christmas decorations. the bomb disposal unit from gloucestershire in three hours away by road arrived the next morning and testing on what the couple had thought was a dummy and what they found it was a live bomb which had a tiny amount of charged off it was taken to a disused quarry five miles ago it was covered in five tons of sand and then detonated.— five tons of sand and then detonated. ., ~ ., ., , , detonated. thank goodness it all worked — detonated. thank goodness it all worked out. _ detonated. thank goodness it all worked out. i— detonated. thank goodness it all worked out. i am - detonated. thank goodness it all worked out. i am helena l all worked out. i am helena humphreys in washington, dc. thank you for your company. you can always get more on our website stop. good night. hello, there. plenty of wintry scenes recorded by our weather watchers across the uk, throughout the weekend, such as here in derbyshire, with the lying snow, but further south, across much of england and south wales, then it turned milder on sunday, with outbreaks of rain moving northwards, and for all of us, the current cold spell will be coming to an end as we head through this week. it will be turning milder, but the payback is it's also going to be wetter and windier for much of the time. now, we've seen this deep area of low pressure just roll its way northwards and eastwards, strong, gusty winds towards channel coasts through the night. still some heavy downpours of rain around, snow over any elevation. this is how we're starting off monday morning. cold and frosty still towards the north, but milder further south, 5 to 7 degrees celsius here. but let's just zoom in on the north of england and north wales where we could see some icy conditions, tricky travelling conditions, i think, particularly over the higher passes of the pennines and across north wales, with some of this rain turning to snow with any elevation. but most of this will be falling as rain, maybe wet snow to lower levels, though, at times with any intensity, and there's a brisk northerly wind blowing. we'll see some strong, gusty winds, particularly across western wales and to the southwest of england. it's going to feel cold in exposure to that wind despite the fact that, in theory, temperatures will be higher than yesterday. largely dry for northern ireland and much of scotland, away from the east, with perhaps a few isolated showers around. so still feeling pretty raw with the briskness of that wind on monday. the same still true on tuesday, but our deep area of low pressure is gradually pushing its way further eastwards. it's very slow moving. there'll still be some patchy outbreaks of rain, i think, across much of northern england. again, with any elevation, this could be falling as snow. still some rain too, just feeding down from western wales towards the southwest of england. but elsewhere, i think it will tend to turn a bit drier, particularly away from east anglia, as we head through the afternoon. largely dry for scotland, but still temperatures struggling to get above freezing over any lying snow. but a drier, brighter day, particularly out towards the west. and it's going to be a very cold night on tuesday. again, a widespread frost with some patches of freezing fog developing. then we've got another low just working its way in from the southwest, and this is going to drag with it some much milderfeeling air. so just look at those temperatures go up. by the time we get to thursday, we're back up into double figures across the board. but it will be wet and windy at times with perhaps some transient snow in the north. bye— bye. voiceover: this is bbc news. we'll have the headlines for you at the top of the hour, which is straight after this programme. welcome to hardtalk. i'm stephen sackur. the latest international climate conference is being hosted by a fossil fuel—enriched fiefdom, the united arab emirates. so does that mean the big oil and gas producers finally get it and are committed to decarbonisation? or could it be a sign that the much—vaunted energy transition is being de—prioritised thanks to geopolitical and economic realities? well, my guest is fatih birol, executive director of the international energy agency. is our addiction to fossilfuels proving too strong to break?