It said it sought "to reach an agreement that guarantees ending the aggression, achieving the withdrawal (of Israel from Gaza) and urgently aiding our people in the Gaza Strip".

The intensified operations came after days of mounting calls for a ceasefire, with US President Donald Trump -- whom Netanyahu is scheduled to meet next week -- among those urging Israel to strike a new deal to halt the war and bring home the hostages still held in Gaza.

Once a bustling seafront spot where young people could hope for a rare respite from war, Gaza City's al-Baqa cafe lay in ruins after an Israeli strike killed 24 people including a journalist and an artist.

The swift resolution of Israel's 12-day war with Iran has revived hopes for a halt to the fighting in Gaza, where more than 20 months of combat have created dire humanitarian conditions for the population of more than two million.

His comments lifted hope for a new ceasefire in the devastating conflict in the Palestinian territory, after US President Donald Trump said he hoped a truce could be sealed within days.

Civil defense spokesman Mahmud Bassal said 35 people were killed in seven Israeli drone and air strikes in various locations, and two others by Israeli fire while waiting for food aid in the Netzarim zone in central Gaza.

US President Donald Trump voiced optimism on Friday about a new ceasefire in Gaza saying an agreement involving Israel and Hamas could come as early as next week.

The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which began operating last month and has largely replaced established humanitarian organisations, "is degrading Palestinians by design, forcing them to choose between starvation or risking their lives."

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez on Thursday said Gaza was in a "catastrophic situation of genocide" and urged the European Union to immediately suspend its cooperation deal with Israel.

The shipment of supplies, plasma and blood will be distributed among hospitals in the Palestinian territory in the coming days, WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.

"I think great progress is being made on Gaza," Trump said, adding that his special envoy Steve Witkoff had told him: "Gaza is very close." He linked his optimism about imminent "very good news" to Israel-Iran ceasefire.

Civil defense spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP that 21 people were killed and around 150 wounded by Israeli fire near an aid point in central Gaza early Tuesday, and that another 25 were killed in a separate incident in south Gaza.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday insisted gains in the conflict against Iran would help with the country's war footing in Gaza and bringing the hostages home but said "more time" was needed.

Protesters in the British capital waved Palestinian flags, donned keffiyeh scarves and carried signs including "Stop arming Israel" and "No war on Iran" as they marched in the sweltering heat.

Civil defense spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP that six people were killed while waiting for aid in the southern Gaza Strip and 15 others in a central area known as the Netzarim corridor, where thousands of Palestinians have gathered daily in the hope of receiving food rations.

"Israeli drones fired at the citizens. Some minutes later, Israeli tanks fired several shells at the citizens, which led to a large number of martyrs and wounded," said Civil defense spokesman Mahmud Bassal.

The G7 statement said that Israel "has a right to defend itself" and stressed "the importance of the protection of civilians," as the growing attacks kill civilians on both sides.

The decision added drama to the major aerospace industry event, which was already under the shadow of last week's deadly crash of Air India's Boeing 787 Dreamliner. Black walls were installed around the stands of five Israeli defense firms at the trade fair in Le Bourget, an airfield on the...

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday he ordered negotiators to "advance" talks on releasing hostages held in Gaza, after sensing an opportunity amid Israel's unprecedented attack on arch-foe Iran.

Rights groups such as Amnesty International and Oxfam organized the demonstration through the city to the International Court of Justice, creating a so-called "red line". With many waving Palestinian flags and some chanting "Stop the Genocide", the demonstrators turned a central park in the city into a sea of red...

Iran announced it will scale back cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), expressing deep dissatisfaction over what it views as the agency’s failure to condemn Israeli attacks on its nuclear facilities.

Paris, France - French President Emmanuel Macron said on Friday that next week's UN conference on a two-state solution for Israel and the Palestinians in New York had been postponed, but would be held "as soon as possible". Macron made the announcement after Israel pounded Iran in a series of...

Pro-Palestinian activists seeking to march to Gaza with the stated aim of breaking Israel's blockade on the territory were stopped Friday in both Libya and Egypt, organisers said.

Israel charged on Thursday that Hamas was "weaponising suffering in Gaza" after a US and Israeli-backed charity accused the Palestinian militant group of killing eight of its aid workers in the territory.

Like the text blocked by Washington to protect its Israeli allies, the draft resolution before the General Assembly calls for "an immediate, unconditional and permanent ceasefire." It also demands "the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages" seized during the unprecedented Hamas attack inside Israel on October 7

Israel's defence minister on Wednesday called on Egypt to block two pro-Palestinian activist convoys planning to head to Egypt's Rafah border crossing with Gaza.

The Gaza civil defence agency said Israeli forces opened fire on people waiting to enter a US-backed food distribution centre on Wednesday, killing 31 and wounding "about 200".

Gazan mother Amal Abu Shalouf ran her hand over her son's face and hair, a brief farewell before a man abruptly sealed the body bag carrying the three-year-old who was killed just hours earlier on Tuesday.

The Al-Amal Hospital in Gaza, one of the few still operating in the Palestinian territory, is now "virtually out of service" due to intense military activity, the head of the WHO said Monday.

Swedish campaigner Greta Thunberg and other activists detained aboard a Gaza-bound aid boat have been taken to a Tel Aviv airport for deportation, Israel said Tuesday, after their vessel was intercepted by naval forces.

The Madleen departed from Italy on June 1 to bring awareness to food shortages in Gaza, which the United Nations has referred to as the "hungriest place on Earth", with the entire population at risk of famine.

I have instructed the military to prevent the Madleen flotilla from reaching Gaza," Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said in a statement from his office. "Turn back because you will not reach Gaza," Katz added, calling the activists "Hamas propaganda mouthpieces".

Cairo, Egypt - An aid ship with 12 activists on board, including Swedish climate campaigner Greta Thunberg, is nearing Gaza, having reached the Egyptian coast, organisers said Saturday. The Madleen, part of the Freedom Flotilla Coalition, left Sicily last week with a cargo of relief supplies "to break Israel's blockade...

Gaza's civil defence agency said Israeli forces killed at least 13 Palestinians on Saturday, six of them in a shooting incident near a US-backed aid distribution centre in the territory's south.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu admitted that Israel is supporting an armed group in Gaza that opposes the militant group Hamas, following comments by a former minister that Israel had transferred weapons to it.

News of the soldiers' deaths came as Gaza's civil defence agency reported 38 killed Friday in Israeli attacks across the territory, where Palestinians observed the Eid al-Adha holiday under the shadow of war for a second consecutive year.

"This is a final and urgent warning ahead of an impending strike," army spokesman Avichay Adraee said. The army "will strike all areas from which rockets are launched."

Paris, France -- French anti-terror prosecutors have opened probes into "complicity in genocide" and "incitement to genocide" after French-Israelis allegedly blocked aid intended for war-torn Gaza last year, they said on Friday. The two investigations, opened after legal complaints, were also to look into possible "complicity in crimes against humanity"...

Negotiator Khalil al-Hayya made the declaration in a speech marking the start of Eid al-Adha festivities, typically a joyous date on the Muslim calendar, but one many Gazans say they will not be able to celebrate this year amid crushing shortages.

The accusation against Israel of genocide has been made with increasing force from quarters ranging from "Schindler's List" star Ralph Fiennes to Amnesty International and some Israeli historians.

Sales to countries considered part of the Abraham Accords -- the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco who signed groundbreaking normalization agreements with Israel in 2020 -- appeared to have sharply risen from 3 percent in 2023 to 12 percent.

Dublin, Ireland -- Ireland's prestigious Trinity College Dublin said on Wednesday that it would cut all links with Israel in protest at "ongoing violations of international and humanitarian law". The university's board informed students by email on Wednesday that it had accepted the recommendations of a taskforce to sever "institutional...

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres decried the deaths of Palestinians seeking food aid as "unacceptable", and the world body's rights chief condemned attacks on civilians as "a war crime" following a similar shooting near the same site on Sunday.

Cries of grief echoed across southern Gaza's Nasser Hospital Monday as dozens came to mourn Hossam Wafi, after the father of six was killed while attempting to get supplies to feed his family.

Gaza's civil defense agency said Israeli gunfire killed at least 31 people and wounded 176 near the aid distribution site in the southern city of Rafah.

Ministers from Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan and Bahrain, along with the Arab League chief, had planned a trip to the Palestinian territory, but Israel said Friday that it would not cooperate.

"At least 10 Palestinians were killed and more than 100 others... were wounded due to gunfire from Israeli vehicles towards thousands of citizens" approaching the US aid site west of Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip, civil defense spokesman Mahmud Bassal said.

French President Emmanuel Macron said on Friday that abandoning war-torn Gaza to its fate and giving Israel a "free pass" would kill the West's credibility with the world.

Negotiations to end nearly 20 months of war have so far failed to achieve a breakthrough, with Israel resuming operations in Gaza in March, ending a six-week truce.

A controversial US-backed aid group for Gaza announced Monday that it had begun distributing food in the war-ravaged Palestinian territory, and decried Hamas "death threats" against organizations supporting its operations.