You're listening to the Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service.

Hello, I'm Oliver Conway.

This edition is published in the early hours of Tuesday the 19th of March.

The US and Israeli leaders speak for the first time in more than a month

amid concern over Israel's planned assault on Raffer.

Israel has not presented us or the world with a plan for how or where they would safely move those civilians, let alone feed

and house them and ensure access to basic things like sanitation.

We also hear about fears of famine in Gaza.

Donald Trump's lawyers say he can't raise the almost half a

billion dollars he needs to appeal against a fraud judgment and Pakistan

confirms it's carried out airstrikes inside Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.

Also in the podcast, the Gambia votes to bring back female genital mutilation.

This practice has done nothing to any woman's body.

And this is something that has been performed since pre-colonial era of date.

And people are wholeheartedly willing that this practice should be done. And the cash

cash points in Ethiopia giving out too much money.

The US has traditionally been Israel's strongest ally, but the Israeli military

offensive against Hamas in Gaza is stretching ties to the limit.

On Monday, for the first time in more than a month the US President

Joe Biden spoke to the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Nesagnahu by phone. The US National

Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said they had discussed the planned

Israeli offensive on the southern Garzan city of Raffa.

...