Closing summary
The Guardian’s live coverage of the crisis in the Middle East is coming to a close for today. Here’s a round-up of the latest key events:
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said that Israel is preparing for an “immediate implementation” of the first stage of Trump’s Gaza plan for the release of Israeli hostages after Hamas agreed to release hostages and some other terms in a US plan to end the war. Trump said he believed Hamas had showed it was “ready for a lasting PEACE” and he put the onus on Netanyahu’s government.
Gaza’s civil defence agency said that Israel had carried out dozens of air strikes and artillery shelling on Gaza City despite Trump’s appeal for Israel to stop. Israeli fire overnight killed six people across the Gaza Strip, according to local authorities.
The death toll in the nearly two-year Israel-Hamas war passed 67,000 Palestinians, Gaza’s health ministry said. The death toll jumped after the ministry said it added more than 700 names to the list after data had been verified.
Palestinian Islamic Jihad, an ally of Hamas, endorsed the group’s response to the peace proposals, saying it represents the stance of the Palestinian resistance. It’s a move that could help pave the way for the release of Israelis still held by both parties.
A senior Hamas official said that Egypt would organise a conference for Palestinian factions to decide on the post-war future of the Gaza Strip. Egypt will host an “intra-Palestinian dialogue on Palestinian unity and the future of Gaza, including the administration of the Gaza Strip”, the official said.
Protests erupted across Europe today, with demonstrators calling for an end to the war. Tens of thousands of people marched in Barcelona, Spain, with demonstrations in Italy and Portugal too. Police arrested protesters at the Palestine Action rally in London. London and Manchester police called for protests to be delayed or cancelled after the terror attack on a synagogue in Manchester on Wednesday.
The Israeli military has been ordered to halt its campaign on Gaza City by its political leadership, Israeli army radio reported on Saturday, while it was preparing for the first phase of Donald Trump’s plan to end the war in Gaza and release all hostages, William Christou writes.
The orders came as the US president, Donald Trump, demanded Israel stop bombing Gaza late on Friday night after welcoming Hamas’s partial acceptance of his proposal to end the nearly two-year war in Gaza.
Despite Trump’s demands, Israel continued striking the Gaza Strip and besieging Gaza City on Saturday.
At least six Palestinian civilians, including two children, were killed in Israeli strikes on a house in Gaza City and a tent housing displaced people in al-Mawasi. Drones also targeted a gathering of people near a bakery in central Gaza City, killing “dozens” of people, according to Wafa, the Palestinian news agency.
Read William’s full report on today’s advancements at the link below:
