Thomas CopelandBBC Verify Live journalist We’ve verified footage from across the Gaza Strip where the Hamas-run government media office says at least 12 people have been killed in flooding. We also used radar analysis to measure the extent of the floods, which followed a severe winter storm, and debunked fake videos made with AI that try to exploit the tragedy. If you’ve followed our coverage of the civil war in Sudan, you’ll recognise this paramilitary commander who was identified by BBC Verify killing unarmed captives. This morning the UK government announced they are sanctioning Al-Fateh Abdullah Idris. Here’s what you need to know. Plus, social media is full of viral videos claiming this year's UK flu season has hit harder than ever. Watch this video to find out what’s really going on. BBC Verify Live will be back on Monday but our verification and eyewitness teams are on duty across the weekend. If you want to see more of BBC Verify’s videos and catch up with our investigations and analysis head to our pages on the BBC News website. Aisha SembhiBBC Verify Live video journalist Here at BBC Verify, we use a range of tools to help us in our investigations. A couple of months ago, we conducted a large-scale investigation into atrocities committed by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF). The RSF has been fighting a civil war against the Sudanese army for more than two and a half years. BBC Verify correspondent Merlyn Thomas talks us through how the team used sources like satellite imagery of the Sudanese city of el-Fasher to understand the scale of the atrocities that took place. This video can not be played How satellite imagery helped us investigate atrocities in Sudan Thomas CopelandBBC Verify Live journalist Satellite images have revealed a World War Two-era runway is being rebuilt by a Chinese company in a South Pacific atoll around 400 miles (600km) from the US territory of Guam. The development of a civilian airstrip on Wolaei island in the Federated States of Micronesia, which is set for completion in the next few weeks, is intended to expand transport links for the island’s 1,000 residents. The runway was first built by imperial Japan in the mid-1940s but was destroyed by US bombers during the war, according to the Habele Institute, a US-based Micronesian educational organisation. After being restored by the US in the 1970s it fell into disrepair and is now being rebuilt by China’s Shandong Hengyue Municipal Engineering Company. Micronesia has a long-standing security and economic partnership with the US, which recently announced a $2bn military infrastructure investment in the nearby main island of Yap. But an expert has told BBC Verify that “the runway project marks a major entry for China” to increase its “presence and influence”. Cleo Paskal, a senior fellow at the US-based Foundation for Defense of Democracies, who travelled for four days on a cargo ship to attend the project’s ground-breaking in May says “it's likely the Chinese-state linked company is taking a loss on the runway in order to get a foothold in the area”. Gerry GeorgievaBBC Verify researcher I’ve been checking a claim made by Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley on LBC radio this morning that “the homicide rate in London is lower than every single US state”. He’s mostly right - the data shows that the UK capital’s homicide rate is lower than in 49 out of the 50 US states - New Hampshire is the exception. In London, official statistics for the financial year to March 2024, external show there were 13.5 homicides per million people. In the US, FBI data, external for the 2024 calendar year shows that almost all US states had a higher rate than that, apart from New Hampshire which recorded 9.9 homicides per million people. Thomas CopelandBBC Verify Live journalist We’ve reported before on this page about AI-generated videos that claim to show real victims of the conflicts in Gaza and Sudan. The accounts behind these videos will try to maximise engagement by posting about new developments that might emotionally resonate with people. Although we’re seeing AI videos now about the flooding in Gaza we have also verified genuine footage of what is happening there. One video in particular has spread widely across social media platforms. It claims to show a group of children in a tent as murky floodwater rises under them. We’ve tracked the video back to a TikTok account where it has gathered more than 10 million views.TikTok has added an “AI-generated” label to this and many other videos posted by the account. All of the videos from the account are either 10 or 15 seconds long. Most publicly available text-to-video AI generators limit their output to this duration because the process of making them is still quite expensive. Other hallmarks of AI-generation include some of the visual elements. The floodwater in this video has an unrealistic translucent quality as it moves and the girl in the pink top appears to have a third hand. Emma Pengelly and Kumar MalhotraBBC Verify We’ve confirmed photos and video shared online today that show a fire burning at an industrial complex in the Russian city of Orsk, not far from the border with Kazakhstan. Several posts on Telegram have claimed that a factory which makes artillery shells was on fire. We can’t independently confirm that nor what caused the fire. The clearest view of the blaze we have verified is in the image above with black smoke rising from an industrial site in Mira Avenue. However, we can’t see the actual building that’s burning. Based on publicly available sources we know a key building of the Orsk Mechanical Plant - listed as a manufacturer of military-industrial products - is next-door to the property above. We also know that a company with the same address as the Orsk Mechanical Plant has been sanctioned by the UK over its work for the Russian defence sector. Earlier, Orenburg’s regional emergency services said rescue workers were tackling a fire at an industrial facility in Orsk. A later update said it had been extinguished. No injuries or deaths were reported. Barbara Metzler and Jacqueline GalvinBBC Verify On today’s BBC Verify Live we’ve been covering the impact of winter storms in Gaza. We’ve been using a specific type of satellite imagery called Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) to help us uncover which parts of southern Gaza are likely to have been flooded. We’re using SAR because it’s particularly effective at detecting water as radar signals reflect very differently when they bounce off water rather than land. It is also a useful tool when there is heavy cloud cover because radar can penetrate clouds to collect data regardless of the weather. We took SAR data from yesterday and put it through a flood mapping algorithm to pinpoint where in southern Gaza the flooding has been detected. We’ve highlighted them in blue on the map below. Shruti MenonBBC Verify senior journalist This video can not be played Video captures dramatic landslide in Philippines A landslide in Talisay city in the Cebu province of Philippines was caught on camera showing a portion of a hillside collapsing onto a road, sending rocks and mud downward with force as motorists - some missing the fall by a few seconds - hurriedly turn around and leave the area. Using Google Street View, I confirmed that the video was filmed on Cebu-Toledo Wharf road by matching distinctive road markings, vegetation patterns and nearby structures. Images from the satellite firm Planet Labs from 10 and 12 December show the same curved road segment and a newly exposed patch of earth. This suggests there has been recent ground disturbance in the area where the landslide happened. Reverse-image searching three freeze-frames suggests the video is new. No-one is reported to have died in the incident. Tamara KovacevicBBC Verify senior journalist During last night’s BBC’s Question Time, the panel was asked whether it mattered that one in three children in Glasgow don’t speak English as their first language. But is this figure right? According to Scottish Government data, external, 20,717 school children in Glasgow – 29% of the total - had English as an additional language in 2024. That’s nearly one in three. There were different levels of proficiency in English. Here is the breakdown: Kayleen DevlinBBC Verify senior journalist The US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control announced yesterday it had sanctioned six shipping companies it says are operating in Venezuela’s oil sector and listed associated vessels it says have engaged in “deceptive and unsafe shipping practices.” We’ve reviewed the Automatic Identification System (AIS) position reports for these ships to determine their most recently reported locations. Four of these six vessels listed have been accused by the US government of previously manipulating or disabling their signals - a tactic that can obscure their true movements. We've been seeing lots of viral TikToks and Reels from people suggesting this year's flu season has hit harder than ever before. The national medical director for NHS England has described this year's strain as a "super flu". We've been looking at the latest statistics - which dropped yesterday - to find out how bad this flu season actually is. This video can not be played Is the flu REALLY worse this year? Emma Pengelly and Kumar MalhotraBBC Verify We’ve been analysing videos being shared online that show reported attacks in Ukraine and Russia overnight. In the Russian city of Tver, north-west of Moscow, we’ve verified footage showing a projectile coming down and an explosion in what looks like a residential district. The area was well-lit and we could match the buildings in the videos to street view on both Google and the Russian search engine Yandex. We also checked the footage was recently uploaded online. Acting regional governor Vitaly Korolev said several people were wounded, including a child, according to Russian state news agency Tass. North-east of Moscow, in the city of Yaroslavl, we’ve also verified a new video of smoke and fire at a large oil refinery belonging to Slavneft–YANOS. Yaroslavl regional governor Mikhail Yevrayev warned residents of a “drone threat” last night without mentioning the oil refinery. In Ukraine, Russian drones struck energy facilities in several regions overnight, leaving a "significant" number of people in the Donetsk and Odesa regions without power, according to Ukraine's national energy operator Ukrenergo, external. Rob CorpBBC Verify Live editor We’re keen to hear what you think the BBC Verify team should be looking into. We're interested in investigating claims you may've seen online in your social feeds. We're also keen to know if you've think an image may have been made using artificial intelligence to spread disinformation. You can also get in touch with BBC Verify if you've got a question about how we verify video posted online or work with satellite imagery. You can send your suggestions to the team here. Benedict Garman and Shayan SardarizadehBBC Verify At least 12 people, including children, have been killed following a winter storm in Gaza that brought flooding and damage to makeshift camps for displaced people, the Hamas-run government media office has said. It added that the deaths were caused by flooding and collapsed buildings. Some 27,000 tents for displaced Gazans had been drenched in water, the statement said. Footage we’ve verified from Gaza City, in the centre of the Strip, shows flooding in a camp for displaced people with water and mud seen inside the tents. Heavy rain has led to tents flooding in Gaza City Matt MurphyBBC Verify senior journalist It's been announced this morning that a Sudanese paramilitary commander - who was identified by BBC Verify killing unarmed captives - has been sanctioned by the UK government. Brig Gen Al-Fateh Abdullah Idris - also known as Abu Lulu - was filmed shooting dead at least 10 people after the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) captured the city of el-Fasher in late October. Thousands of civilians are now believed to have been killed by RSF troops after the Sudanese military withdrew from the city in the Darfur region. A day after BBC Verify published its investigation into Abu Lulu, the RSF released footage showing him being led into a prison cell by paramilitary troops. The commander, who had regularly appeared in online propaganda videos, has not been seen since. In a statement, the Foreign Office said it believed Abu Lulu was "responsible for violence against individuals based on ethnicity and religion, and the deliberate targeting of civilians". Sanctions were also announced against three other RSF commanders - deputy RSF leader Abdul Rahim Hamdan Dagalo, Gedo Hamdan Ahmed and Tijani Ibrahim Moussa Mohamed. All of the targeted individuals are subject to travel bans and asset freezes. You can read our investigation into Abu Lulu here, and our wider examination of how the el-Fasher massacre unfolded here. Paul BrownBBC Verify senior journalist We've been keeping an eye on the tanker seized by the US government on Wednesday. The Skipper is currently around 40 nautical miles east of Guadeloupe and heading north. It has travelled just over 300 nautical miles since switching its transponder system on at around 22:00 GMT on Wednesday. Ship-tracking tool MarineTraffic shows the tanker was accompanied by a US Coast Guard vessel for around three hours yesterday afternoon. TankerTrackers.com says the Skipper is likely heading for the port of Houston in Texas - although MarineTraffic’s data doesn’t provide a destination. Overnight Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said the tanker was carrying 1.9 million barrels of oil and accused the US government of initiating a "new era of criminal naval piracy in the Caribbean". At a briefing yesterday, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the US plans to seize the oil on board the Skipper, after the necessary legal process. The US Treasury has also announced sanctions on six other vessels said to be carrying Venezuelan oil. We hope to bring you more on those Rob CorpBBC Verify Live editor Good morning. Following Wednesday’s seizure by the US of a crude oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela we’re tracking where it is in the Caribbean. We’re also looking at six other ships the US has imposed new sanctions on which it says carry Venezuelan oil. Footage has emerged of attacks in Russia overnight with video apparently showing a fire at an oil refinery in Yaroslavl, north-east of the Russian capital, Moscow. Reports also suggest a fire has broken out at a munitions factory in the Russian city of Orsk close to the border with Kazakhstan. We’re checking to see if there is verifiable footage of what’s happened there. And our fact-check team is looking at whether one in three children in Glasgow speak English as a second language following a discussion on the BBC’s Question Time last night.