At least 10,812 Palestinians, including 4,412 children, have been killed in Israeli strikes on Gaza since 7 October, the health ministry in Gaza has said in its latest update on Thursday.
Eighteen Palestinians have been killed and at least 20 others injured by the Israel Defence Forces during a raid on Thursday on Jenin city and its refugee camp in the occupied West Bank. According to Palestinian health ministry figures, at least 178 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank since the 7 October attack on Israel.
Officials and diplomats are negotiating a days-long ceasefire in Gaza in exchange for the release of hostages, including children, women, elderly and sick people, the Guardian understands. The discussions include the possibility of a one- to three-day ceasefire, although nothing has been agreed, sources with knowledge of the negotiations have said.
The White House announced that Israel would begin to implement four-hour “humanitarian pauses” in parts of northern Gaza to allow people to leave. The US national security spokesperson, John Kirby, described it as “a significant first step”. The US state department later said on Thursday that there will be two humanitarian corridors for civilians to leave hostile areas of northern Gaza.
The Israeli military has said it has not agreed to a ceasefire but that it will continue to allow “tactical, local pauses” to let in humanitarian aid into Gaza. “There’s no ceasefire, I repeat there’s no ceasefire. What we are doing, that four-hour window, these are tactical, local pauses for humanitarian aid,” an army spokesperson said.
Thousands of Palestinians continued to flee south from northern Gaza. Israel said it had allowed movement along the Salah al-Din road – the main highway that runs along the Gaza Strip – for the fifth consecutive day. Images of the mass exodus showed many people evacuating on foot with their belongings tied to their backs, with some pushing wheelchairs and prams.
The Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt reopened on Thursday for limited evacuations. Several dozen foreign passport holders and dependents, along with 12 medical evacuees, were reportedly able to cross the border on Thursday after the crossing was suspended for a day.
The International Red Cross temporarily paused its patient escorts after its convoy of trucks came under fire in Gaza. William Schomburg, the head of the organization’s Gaza office, called the incident “deeply alarming” and “unacceptable”. The organisation has since resumed bringing patients to the Egypt border crossing.
The French president, Emmanuel Macron, has rejected Israeli plans to push civilians into safe zones in the south of Gaza and said the world must pursue a humanitarian ceasefire as the only way to save lives in the territory. Macron described the proposal for safe zones in the south of Gaza as a very bad idea that would not guarantee safety because no political agreement existed for them.
Belgium’s deputy prime minister, Petra De Sutter, has called on the Belgian government to adopt sanctions against Israel and investigate the bombings of hospitals and refugee camps in Gaza. “It is clear that Israel does not care about the international demands for a ceasefire,” she said, calling on the EU to immediately suspend its association agreement with Israel.
Netanyahu rejected a deal for a five-day ceasefire with Palestinian militant groups in Gaza in return for the release of some of the hostages held in the territory early in the war, according to sources familiar with the negotiations.
More than half of the British nationals seeking to escape Gaza for Egypt have managed to do so, but there are still distressing cases of families being split up, the Foreign Office has confirmed.
The UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) has said it is seeking nearly half a billion dollars to address the most critical humanitarian needs of people in the Gaza Strip and occupied West Bank.
