Closing summary
Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, confirmed on Sunday he would launch an offensive into the southern city of Rafah despite growing international concern over the fate of Palestinian civilians sheltering there. Netanyahu was quoted by AFP as saying that “no amount of international pressure will stop us from realising all the goals of the war”. Netanyahu’s office has said the Israeli army was preparing “operational issues” and the evacuation of the civilian population from Rafah, the southernmost city in Gaza, where more than a million people displaced from elsewhere in the territory have sought shelter.
Germany’s chancellor, Olaf Scholz, warned that an Israeli assault on Rafah would make regional peace “very difficult”, after talks with Jordanian King Abdullah. This is one of the main arguments he will bring to talks with Netanyahu later on Sunday during his trip to the region, he said. “Israel has every right to protect itself. At the same time, it cannot be that those in Gaza who fled to Rafah are directly threatened by whatever military actions and operations are undertaken there,” the German leader said.
Benjamin Netanyahu responded to a call by Chuck Schumer, the US Senate leader and ally of Joe Biden, for Israel to hold new elections. On Thursday, Schumer said he believed Netanyahu “has lost his way by allowing his political survival to take precedence over the best interests of Israel”. The Israeli prime minister responded on Sunday, saying that a pause in fighting to allow for elections to take place would paralyse the country for months. He said: “If we stop the war now, before all of its goals are achieved, this means that Israel will have lost the war, and this we will not allow. Therefore, we cannot, and will not, succumb to this pressure.” Netanyahu told CNN that he believed the Schumer intervention was “totally inappropriate”.
The Palestinian foreign ministry has said that Benjamin Netanyahu’s “continuous threats” to invade Rafah, where about half of Gaza’s 2.3 million population have sought refuge, “pose a blatant challenge to the international and American consensus on protecting civilians”. It said in a statement on X that “blind revenge dominates the Israeli government and threatens the security and stability of the region and the world”.
Trucks of flour have reached northern Gaza for distribution to areas that have had no aid in four months, Palestinian media reported on Sunday. A convoy of 12 trucks arrived in the north of the enclave on Saturday – six in Gaza City and six in the Jabalia refugee camp – carrying supplies to also be distributed to the northernmost areas of Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun, according to reports.
There have been no medical evacuations from northern Gaza for more than a month so severely injured people are trapped in damaged hospitals where they cannot get adequate treatment, Cadus, a leading medical charity, warned.
An Israeli strike overnight killed 12 people in one house in Deir al-Balah in the centre of the tiny, crowded Gaza Strip, the health ministry said.
At least 31,645 Palestinians have been killed and 73,676 injured in Israeli strikes on Gaza since 7 October, the Gaza health ministry said in a statement on Sunday.
Israeli airstrikes hit several sites in southern Syria on Sunday morning, injuring a soldier, Syrian state media reported, according to the Associated Press. State news agency Sana, citing an unnamed military official, said air defences shot down some of the missiles, which came from the direction of the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. The strikes led to “material losses” and the injuring of a soldier, the statement said earlier.
Updated
A source familiar with the truce talks in Qatar has told Reuters the head of Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency would join the delegation attending the negotiations with Qatari, Egyptian and US mediators.
Hamas presented a new ceasefire proposal last week including an exchange of Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners. Israel’s security cabinet is to meet to discuss it before the delegation leaves.
Netanyahu has already said the proposal was based on “unrealistic demands”, but a Palestinian official familiar with mediation efforts said chances for a deal looked better with Hamas having given more details on the proposed prisoner swap.
“The mediators felt positive about Hamas’ new proposal. Some in Israel felt the group made some improvement on its previous position and it is now in the hands of Netanyahu alone to say whether an agreement is imminent,” the official said.
