Israeli airstrikes killed at least 38 Palestinians in Gaza, hospital officials said on Sunday, as Israel’s military said it has struck over 100 targets in the embattled enclave in the past day.
The strikes came as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was preparing to fly to Washington for talks at the White House aimed at pushing forward ceasefire efforts.
Separately, an Israeli official said the Israeli security Cabinet on Saturday night approved sending aid into the northern part of Gaza, where civilians are suffering from acute food shortages.
The official declined to offer more details. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to discuss the decision with the media.
In Yemen, a spokesperson for the Houthi rebel group announced in a prerecorded message that the group had launched ballistic missiles targeting Ben Gurion airport overnight. The Israeli military said these had been intercepted.
President Donald Trump has floated a plan for an initial 60-day ceasefire that would include a partial release of hostages held by Hamas in exchange for an increase in humanitarian supplies allowed into Gaza. The proposed truce calls for talks on ending the 21-month war altogether.
Israel strikes dozens of targets
Twenty people were killed and 25 wounded after Israeli strikes hit two houses in Gaza City, according to Mohammed Abu Selmia, the director of Shifa Hospital that services the area.
In southern Gaza, 18 Palestinians were killed by strikes in Muwasi, an area on Gaza’s Mediterranean where many displaced people live in tents, officials at Nasser Hospital in the nearby city of Khan Younis, told The Associated Press. Two families were among the dead according to the hospital.
The Israeli military had no immediate comment on the individual strikes, but said it struck 130 targets across the Gaza Strip in the last 24 hours.
It said the strikes targeted Hamas command and control structures, storage facilities, weapons and launchers, and that they killed a number of militants in northern Gaza.
The war began when Hamas attacked Israel on Oct 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 others hostage.
Israel responded with an offensive that has killed over 57,000 Palestinians, more than half of them women and children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.
The ministry, which is under Gaza’s Hamas government, does not differentiate between civilians and combatants. The UN and other international organisations see its figures as the most reliable statistics on war casualties.
Ceasefire deal being discussed
The strikes occur as efforts to reach a ceasefire deal appeared to gain momentum. Netanyahu’s office said his government will send a negotiating team to talks in Qatar on Sunday to conduct indirect talks, adding that Hamas was seeking “unacceptable” changes to the proposal.
The planned talks in Qatar comes ahead of Netanyahu’s planned visit on Monday to Washington to meet US President Donald Trump to discuss the deal. It is unclear if a deal will be reached ahead of Netanyahu’s White House meeting.
Hamas has sought guarantees that the initial truce would lead to a total end to the war and withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza. Previous negotiations have stalled over Hamas demands of guarantees that further negotiations would lead to the war’s end, while Netanyahu has insisted Israel would resume fighting to ensure the militant group’s destruction.
Israel to send delegation for indirect talks with Hamas
Jerusalem, Jul 6 (IANS): Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has instructed a negotiating team to travel to Qatar on Sunday for talks with Hamas on a ceasefire-hostages deal, the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office said in a statement.
After assessing the situation, Israel accepted the invitation for close talks and continued negotiations for the release of Israeli hostages held in Gaza based on the Qatari proposal that Israel agreed to, according to the statement.
The proposal reportedly includes a 60-day ceasefire, the release, in five stages, of 10 Israeli live hostages, and the handover of 18 hostage bodies, as well as the release of Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails.
Meanwhile, the statement said that Israel was informed on Saturday evening that Hamas demanded changes to the proposal, which are “unacceptable to Israel.”
Israel’s state-owned Kan TV News reported that the changes demanded by Hamas concern guarantees regarding a quick transition to negotiations to end the war, the inclusion of Türkiye among the guarantor countries of the agreement, and details related to the distribution of humanitarian aid and the withdrawal of Israeli military forces from the Gaza Strip.
On Friday, Hamas said in a statement that it has delivered a “positive” response to mediators over a Gaza ceasefire proposal, adding it is “seriously prepared to immediately enter into a round of negotiations on the mechanism for implementing this framework.”
On Saturday, according to a source familiar with the matter, a Hamas member close to the movement’s leadership, Hamas proposed minor changes to the existing draft, but did not deviate significantly from the core elements of the mediation framework, Xinhua news agency reported.
Regarding humanitarian assistance, the source said Hamas emphasized that “aid must be delivered in sufficient quantities to ensure the uninterrupted operation of bakeries, hospitals, and essential services.”
“Hamas insists that humanitarian aid be brought in through neutral and internationally recognized organizations, including the United Nations, the Red Crescent, and other relevant agencies,” the source added.
Regarding the withdrawal of Israeli forces, the source said that “Hamas does not oppose slight adjustments to the proposed withdrawal to the March 2 lines, provided the details are clarified through indirect negotiations.”