Gaza live: Israeli protesters demand ceasefire as war enters 10th month
Live Updates
Israel conducted new raids on the villages of Odla and Ytma south of Nablus in the Occupied West Bank, according to Palestinian news agency Wafa.
Israeli soldiers fired live rounds and rubber bullets at Palestinians. They also activated stun grenades and tear gas.
US President Joe Biden is expected to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in July when he travels to Washington to address a joint session of Congress, according to a report by CNN.
Netanyahu was invited to address Congress by the Republican and Democratic House leadership, but ties with the Biden administration are under strain.
Israel has released 435 million shekels ($116m) of tax revenue it was withholding from the Palestinian Authority, according to the Israeli and Palestinian finance ministries.
The transfer to the Palestinian Authority (PA) is the first of its kind since April and comes after Norway warned that the PA could collapse this summer because of its poor finances.
Far-right Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has been opposing releasing funds to the PA.
Israel announced the funds were released the same day it seized five square miles of land in the occupied West Bank.
An Israeli settler has killed a Palestinian man near the town of as-Samu, south of the city of Hebron in the occupied West Bank, according to Al Jazeera.
The report says that a settler shot the man dead while he was herding his sheep.
Israel has launched fresh strikes on Lebanon hitting the southern Lebanese towns of towns of Khiam, Aita al-Shaab and Markaba and has conducted fly-overs of Beirut, according to Lebanon’s state media.
Tensions escalated on Wednesday after Israel assassinated a senior Hezbollah commander in Tyre and Hezbollah responded by firing at least 100 rockets into Israel.
Ukraine and Israel held a rare phone call discussing bilateral cooperation on threats posed by Russia and Iran.
“We also exchanged views on a number of regional and global threats posed by Russia, Iran, and North Korea,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said on X, referring to a call with his counterpart Israeli Katz.
The call is notable because Middle East Eye reported that US officials are concerned Russia could step up its support for Iran’s so-called "Axis of Resistance" if Israel launches an offensive on Lebanon.
The Financial Times also reports that the US is trying to arrange a deal to transfer older model Patriot air defence systems from Israel to Ukraine.
A surveillance video has been released showing the moment two Israeli soldiers were attacked with a knife at a mall in the northern Israeli city of Karmiel.
The video captures a man in a blue shirt and baseball hat lunging at the two Israeli soldiers. He jabs a knife repeatedly into both men's necks. One of the Israeli soldiers then raises his weapon and appears to shoot at the attacker.
The Israeli army said one soldier, identified as Alexander Yakiminski, died from the attack and the other was injured.
Hezbollah has acknowledged firing 100 Katyusha rockets at Israel in response to the latter’s assassination of a senior commander in the Iran-backed group.
Hezbollah said the rockets targeted two Israeli military positions in the Golan Heights.
A democratic lawmaker endorsed by pro-Israel lobby Aipac has slammed Israel for seizing large swaths of the occupied West Bank.
Democratic Congresswoman Elissa Slotkin, who is running for a Senate seat, said it "inflames" tensions in the region.
“These land seizures are illegal, they make a two-state solution even more distant and they inflame tensions at a time when everyone should be trying to de-escalate the situation in the Middle East,” Slotkin said on X.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office has released a statement saying it wants to reserve the right to continue its offensive on Gaza after a hostage exchange.
The statement, reported by Israeli media, suggests that Israel is opposing a ceasefire proposal because it rejects a guarantee for a cessation of hostilities after hostages in Gaza and Palestinian prisoners are exchanged.
“Hamas continues to insist on a principle clause in the outline that would prevent Israel from resuming fighting after phase one of the deal - something that is unacceptable to Israel,” the statement, which Israeli media is attributing to a senior Israeli security official, says.
The US insists that Israel supports a plan for a full-cessation of hostilities in Gaza which has been endorsed by the UN Security Council.
Israel has pummelled the Gaza Strip with air strikes in the last 24 hours, with Al Jazeera reporting at least 27 Palestinians killed in Gaza City alone.
According to Arabic media reports, Israel also bombed a school housing displaced people next to Nasser Medical Complex to the west of Khan Younis.
Israel’s military has claimed responsibility for a strike that killed senior Hezbollah commander Mohammad Nehmeh Nasser.
The military said Nasser, who was killed in a strike on the southern Lebanese city of Tyre, was responsible for Hezbollah’s missile attacks on Israel.
On social media, some photographs are circulating showing Nasser with Qasem Soleimani, the former head of the Quds Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. MEE could not verify the photographs.
A targeted assassination of Nasser would represent an escalation in the cross-border fighting between Hezbollah and Israel.
Heavy rocket fire is being reported in northern Israel, according to Israeli media.
The barrage of rocket fire comes after Hezbollah announced that Israel assassinated one of its senior commanders, Abu Nema Nasser, in the Lebanese city of Tyre.
Israel has approved a huge 12.7 square kilometre land seizure in the occupied West Bank, called the largest land grab in three decades by monitoring group Peace Now.
The Israeli agency handling land affairs for the occupied territories declared the land in the Jordan Valley "state property" in June, according to a declaration obtained by AFP on Wednesday.
Israel and the UN have negotiated the deployment of Elon Musk's Starlink communications system in the Gaza Strip, according to a report by Axios.
The move is aimed at helping protect aid workers and increase aid distribution across the enclave, a number of officials told the outlet.
Much of the UN's aid distribution in Gaza has been suspended over safety fears and obstruction by Israel.
"A team from the UN security department is heading to Israel as part of our continuing engagement on security related issues to the UN operations in Gaza," a senior UN official told Axios.
