🔴Live: Hamas number three killed by Israeli operation, US says

File photo of a militant from Hamas's military wing taken during a rally in Nusseirat, Gaza, on August 18, 2023. © Adel hana, AP

Israel killed the Hamas militant group’s third-in-command Marwan Issa last week, the White House said Monday, after Israel previously said he had been targeted in a Gaza airstrike but did not confirm his death. In a phone call earlier Monday, US President Joe Biden told Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu he was deeply concerned about a planned ground offensive in Rafah, adding that an operation in the overcrowded southern Gaza city would be a “mistake”. Follow our liveblog for the latest developments in the Israel-Hamas war.  

Summary:

• Israeli forces launched another raid early Monday on the Al-Shifa hospital in northern Gaza, where tens of thousands of people have been sheltering. World Health Organization (WHO) chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus voiced concern over the raid, noting “hospitals should never be battlegrounds”.
• Israel killed Hamas's third-in-command, Marwan Issa, last week, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said on Monday. 
• In a phone call with Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, US President Joe Biden said he was deeply concerned about a planned ground offensive in Rafah and warned it would be a "mistake". 
• Israel's intelligence chief, Qatar's premier and Egyptian officials were expected to hold talks in Doha Monday on a potential Gaza truce and hostage exchange deal, according to sources.
• The UN food agency on Monday said “famine is imminent” in northern Gaza, where an estimated 70 percent of the population faces catastrophic hunger.
• Israel on Monday blocked UNRWA chief Philippe Lazzarini from entering Gaza in what Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry called “an unprecedented move”. 
• At least 31,726 Palestinians have been killed and 73,792 wounded since Israel started its offensive on Gaza, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run enclave. Around 1,140 people were killed in the Hamas-led October 7 attacks and 250 people taken hostage, according to Israeli figures, with 132 still missing.

Yesterday's key developments:

• After a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said he had talked about the need to provide comprehensive humanitarian aid to the people in Gaza. “We cannot stand by and watch Palestinians risk starvation,” Scholz said.
• The Israeli military said on Sunday that a soldier believed to have been held hostage in the Gaza Strip had died during Hamas’s October 7 attack.
• Gaza's health ministry on Sunday reported that at least 61 people had been killed in Israeli airstrikes overnight in the central region of the enclave, including 12 members of the same family, whose house in Deir al-Balah was hit.

About casualty figures from Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry:

Gaza’s health ministry collects data from the enclave’s hospitals and the Palestinian Red Crescent.

The health ministry does not report how Palestinians were killed, whether from Israeli airstrikes and artillery barrages or errant Palestinian rocket fire. It describes all casualties as victims of “Israeli aggression”.

The ministry also does not distinguish between civilians and combatants. 

Throughout four wars and numerous skirmishes between Israel and Hamas, UN agencies have cited the Hamas-run health ministry’s death tolls in regular reports. The International Committee of the Red Cross and Palestinian Red Crescent also use the numbers.

In the aftermath of war, the UN humanitarian office has published final death tolls based on its own research into medical records. The UN's counts have largely been consistent with the Gaza health ministry’s, with small discrepancies. 

For more on the Gaza health ministry’s tolls, click here.

(FRANCE 24 with AP) 

(FRANCE 24 with AFP, AP and Reuters)