Will, this video is hard to look at, but what can you tell us about it? I know there's not a whole lot of information, but it gets to the desperation that we're seeing out there.

Well, this location in Southern Georgia, the Rafa crossing is essentially one of the only lifelines for the 2.2 million people in Gaza because it's where you can bring in supplies from Egypt. There's always a long line of trucks waiting to cross, but they don't always get through. Today, we know that there were dozens of trucks that did get through, but their efforts to distribute aid in Gaza were hampered by these large, desperate crowds. You're talking about hundreds of people, at least that's what we can ascertain from this footage, jumping on the trucks, trying to break in and grab whatever items they could. It seemed as if it was really a mad dash. And at some point, gunfire erupts. So adding to the chaos and the confusion is the danger of bullets whizzing through the air. We don't know who was firing the shots. We don't know how it started or necessarily why. But in a chaotic situation like that, when people are so hungry and so desperate and so determined to try to get what they can, in many cases, just to support themselves and their families, but there could also be potentially looting, we saw that there were tires that were set on fire and then you had the gunshots ring out as well.

Listen to what it sounded like at the height of all of this. It is Christmas Eve, Jim. These people have lived through week after week of airstrikes. There's been ground combat that's now expanding. The IDF, the Israeli military moving into central and Southern Gaza, their operations. There have been airstrikes throughout all of these areas. And now on top of that, a brawl around the relief trucks and gunfire. People are living an absolute hellish nightmare right now in Gaza and this video is all you really need to look at to just get a little bit of a glimpse of what it's like for them. And this is why the call for aid, the call for help, the call to do whatever the world can to improve the situation for more than two million people living through this is even more urgent on this Christmas Eve than it's ever been.

Yeah, well, that video right there just goes to the horror of what life has like right now in that part of the world. We just don't know. The gunfire is emanating in that video. Is that something we can ascertain from looking at it? Yes. We just don't know. Okay.

It's in the video, but we don't know where the shots are being fired from. You don't see, there's no reports of anybody injured that we know of. But again, information could be slow going. A lot of times people have to climb up on a roof just to get an Internet signal to feedback video like this. Our journalists on the ground in Gaza work so hard to record moments, and sometimes it can take hours and hours and hours just to get the information back to us, to get a phone signal to get the footage back. And so we hope to learn more about what exactly happened today in Southern Georgia at the Rafa crossing, but you can see clearly in the pictures it was a situation of people who are driven to the edge of desperation.

They.

Are so desperate and so determined to try to get what they can, grabbing whatever they can, running for it and then having to essentially hear gunfire, wonder if they're going to have to dodge bullets after airstrikes and everything else that they've gone through. By the way, most of these people on the verge of starvation are extremely hungry because there's so little food and water, even drinking water available in Gaza right now.

Barak, I do want to ask you about this drone attack in just a few moments, but I wanted to go back to that video that Will Ripley was talking about near the Rafa border crossing where we saw gunfire breaking out, people almost running in a panic with relief supplies that had come in. I guess what's your sense when you talk to your sources about the level of desperation inside Gaza? This just gives you a sense that things could really spiral out of control in a significant way that it just might become difficult for anybody to get a handle or a lid on the situation. What's your sense of it?

First, I agree with you, Jim, that the situation is very, very serious and it's getting worse by the day. I think what is most challenging is that in a few weeks, the Israeli military is going to phase out this operation and move from the high intensity phase to the low intensity phase, which means that most of the IDF soldiers will go out of the Palestinian cities. Then you'll have a vacuum all over the Gaza Strip, and then either Hamas will come back again, or we will see the same picture as we saw in Rafach today, we'll see it all over the Gaza Strip. The number one challenge now is to find a way for somebody to be in charge of law and order in a few weeks in Gaza so that all this humanitarian aid that's coming in won't be looted, will reach the people who need it. Unfortunately, at that moment, there's nobody that can do it.

Right, because, Baraq, one of the conversations that really hasn't been fully dealt with is who is going to be the governing authority in the near future? I can't imagine Israel is going to want Hamas to be that governing authority. When you see the chaos breakout that we saw today, I mean, that is going to be a major challenge.

Of course. If it's not from us and if there's no other volunteer that can take the Kazakhstan strip under its responsibility, the Egyptians are not going to do it, the Saudis are not going to do it, the Marathis are not going to do it, then Israel can find itself, again, not next year and not six months from now, but a few weeks from now in a situation where it will have to take responsibility for two million Palestinians in Gaza. And this is the last thing Israel wants. But if there's not going to be any alternative governing body, and for now there is not, the responsibility will lie at Israel's table.

And, Barack, what do you make of the Pentagon's out to tangling out Iran for this latest drone attack on this commercial ship? It does sound as though that tensions are really building, and it almost feels like a foreshadowing of something to come to send a message to the Huthi rebels, to send a message to the Iranians potentially. What can you tell us?

I think what's important and interesting in this recent attack that generated from Iran, this drone attack against this ship near the Coast of India, is that it's a attack that we haven't seen for many, many months. Something like a year ago, we saw almost every week an Iranian attack on some a vessel that had either a strong connection or a weak connection to Israel. This was part of this shadow war between Israel and Iran because the Israelis also attacked Iranian vessels, and this was this tip for tat. But we haven't seen this for a long, long time. And the fact that the Iranians decided to resume those attacks, those direct attacks from Iran against Israeli vessels or vessels that are affiliated with Israeli companies, I think it's a very worrisome sign because it's no doubt an escalation after what we've seen in the last few weeks.

When we were talking with Kevin Leptach earlier about this on this program, there is a sense in the Biden administration that the Iranians may be setting something of a bit of a trap and that they want to almost bait the Israelis in the US to, I guess, muster some response that would widen the conflict, make things messier in the region. I suppose there's that side of it too, that has to be dealt with.

Senior Israeli officials that I talk to are very aware that that's the case. This is why you did not see Israel retaliating against the Huthis in Yemen, because the Israelis say this is exactly what the Iranians and the Huthis want. They want to distract us from Gaza. They want to distract us from trying to deter Hezbolla in the north, and we're not going to do it. And therefore, Israel gives a chance for this international maritime coalition in the Red Sea. But on the other hand, the Israelis do say that they think that the US should do something about it, about the Huthis, and you see that every day the Huthis are escalating their attacks on US vessels in the Red Sea, US Navy vessels, just the other day an attack on a US ship. And when I speak to US officials in Washington, they say and they recognize that this is an option that's on the table, US taking military action against the Huthis. It's being considered in the Pentagon, it's being considered in the White House. Secretary of Defense, Austin, when he was just here in Tel Aviv a week ago, he told the Israelis, We are not taking a military action off the table when it comes to the Huthis.

All right, Barack Ravid, perhaps on and we're going to be watching over these holidays. Thank you so much. Appreciate the time today.

Thank you, Jim, and I hope you all have a calm holiday season.

You as well.