Jerusalem:

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday denounced a “volcano of anti-Semitism” and international criticism of Israel’s war in Gaza, insisting that no pressure would stop it from defending itself.

“If Israel is forced to stand alone, Israel will stand alone,” Netanyahu said.

Speaking at a Holocaust Remembrance Day ceremony at the Yad Vashem memorial in Jerusalem, he lamented that when the Nazis killed six million Jews during World War II, his people “were totally defenceless against those who sought our destruction.

“No nation came to our aid,” he said as the Israeli flag billowed at half mast and survivors of the Holocaust prepared to light torches.

“Today, we again confront enemies bent on our destruction,” Netanyahu told the large crowd gathered for the ceremony. 

One yellow chair sat empty representing the hostages still held captive by Hamas in Gaza.

“I say to the leaders of the world, no amount of pressure, no decision by any international forum, will stop Israel from defending itself.”

He lamented the surge of criticism seen around the world against Israel over its war in Gaza, ignited after Hamas’s unprecedented October 7 attack. And he denounced “this terrible volcano of anti-Semitism” that he said was surging around the world.

Netanyahu also compared the protests seen at universities across the United States and around the world to the discrimination against Jews at German universities during World War II.

“What a distortion of justice and history,” he said.

The criticism, he said, was not “due to the actions that we do, but because we exist… because we are Jews.

“You will not chain our hands… Israel will continue to fight human evil… until victory,” he said.

“We will defeat our genocidal enemies. Never again is now!”

Gaza’s bloodiest-ever war began following Hamas’s attack on Israel that resulted in the deaths of more than 1,170 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.

Hamas also seized some 250 hostages during the attack. Israel estimates 128 are still held captive in Gaza, including 35 the army says are dead.

Vowing to destroy Hamas, Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 34,683 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Jerusalem:

Israel’s military said a barrage of rockets fired earlier Sunday from the besieged Gaza Strip towards the Kerem Shalom border crossing had killed three soldiers and wounded a dozen others.

Three of the 12 wounded were in serious condition, the military told AFP.

The armed wing of the Palestinian group Hamas earlier claimed the rocket attack, which led Israeli authorities to close the crossing, used to deliver aid into Gaza.

The military said 14 rockets were fired at the crossing from an area adjacent to the Rafah crossing.

In response, the air force carried out a rapid response and destroyed the launchers from which the projectiles were fired, military spokesman Peter Lerner told journalists in an online briefing.

“It’s a very serious event from our perspective, it’s unacceptable, and the IDF (army) is investigating why the soldiers were killed as the siren was sounding,” he said.

The army was “not aware of any interception that took place” during the incoming fire, he said.

“The airforce will look into exactly what happened,” Lerner added.

The soldiers were hit while guarding heavy machinery, tanks and bulldozers that are stationed in the area.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

New Delhi:

Israel’s United Nations ambassador displayed a yellow star on his chest Monday as he addressed the Security Council, provocatively pledging to wear the badge until members of the body condemn Hamas “atrocities.”

“Some of you have learned nothing in the past 80 years. Some of you have forgotten why this body was established,” envoy Gilad Erdan said, as he denounced the Security Council for “staying silent” over the unprecedented deadly attacks by Hamas operatives against Israel on October 7.

The deeply divided 15-member council has not adopted a single resolution on the three-week-long war between Israel and Hamas.

“So, I will remind you. From this day on, each time you look at me you will remember what staying silent in the face of evil means,” the ambassador said.

“Just like my grandparents, and the grandparents of millions of Jews, from now on my team and I will wear yellow stars,” he said, standing up to affix one on the breast of his suit inscribed with the words “Never Again,” in reference to the yellow stars Jews were forced to wear by the Nazis.

But Erdan will wear it “as a symbol of pride,” he said.

“We will wear this star until you wake up and condemn the atrocities of Hamas.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has called the October 7 attacks the worst against the Jewish people since the Holocaust.

For weeks the Security Council has been riven by divisions over the war and its impact, rejecting four draft resolutions about the conflict.

Some texts were blocked by the United States, a close Israel ally, because they did not mention Israel’s right to defend itself.

Another presented by the Americans was stymied by Russia and China in particular because it did not clearly call for a ceasefire.

In light of the impasse, the UN General Assembly last Friday adopted by a large majority a nonbinding resolution requesting an “immediate humanitarian truce,” but not mentioning Hamas. 

Israel, through Erdan, blasted the text, saying it will “go down as infamy.”

During Monday’s Security Council meeting, several speakers, while denouncing the Hamas attacks, highlighted the price paid by inhabitants of Gaza, where health officials say more than 8,300 people have been killed in the Hamas-run Palestinian territory.

Philippe Lazzarini, head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, or UNRWA, said the siege of Gaza amounts to collective punishment of its residents.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Israeli ground forces pushed deeper into Gaza on Monday, advancing in tanks and other armored vehicles on the territory’s main city and freeing a soldier held captive by Hamas militants. The Israeli Prime Minister rejected calls for a ceasefire as airstrikes landed near hospitals where thousands of Palestinians are sheltering beside the wounded.

The military said a soldier captured during Hamas’ brutal October 7 incursion was rescued in Gaza — the first rescue since the weekslong war began. Military officials provided few details but said in a statement that Pvt. Ori Megidish, 19, was “doing well” and had met with her family.

ALSO READ | Lost voice: On India’s abstention on the Gaza vote at the UN

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu welcomed her home, saying the “achievement” by Israel’s security forces “illustrates our commitment to free all the hostages.”

He also rejected calls for a ceasefire to facilitate the release of captives or end the war, which he has said will be long and difficult. “Calls for a ceasefire are calls for Israel to surrender to Hamas,” he told a news conference. “That will not happen.”

Mr. Netanyahu, who faces mounting anger over Israel’s failure to prevent the worst surprise attack on the country in a half century, also said he had no plans to resign.

Hostage situation

Hamas and other militant groups are believed to be holding some 240 captives, including men, women and children. Mr. Netanyahu has faced mounting pressure to secure their release even as Israel acts to crush Hamas and end its 16-year rule over the territory.

Hamas, which has released four hostages, has said it would let the others go in return for thousands of Palestinian prisoners held by Israel, including many implicated in deadly attacks on Israelis. Israel has dismissed the offer, and Mr. Netanyahu said the ground invasion “creates the possibility” of getting the hostages out, adding that Hamas will “only do it under pressure.”

ALSO READ | Israel-Hamas war, Day 25 LIVE updates

Hamas released a short video Monday purporting to show three other female captives. One of the women delivers a brief statement — likely under duress — criticising Israel’s response to the hostage crisis. It was not clear when the Hamas video was made.

Amos Aloni, whose daughter Danielle appeared in the video, told reporters that he and his wife were shocked when she appeared on TV but also felt “relief from her being alive and seeing her.”

Gaza operations

The military has been vague about its operations inside Gaza, including the location and number of troops. Israel has declared a new “phase” in the war but stopped short of declaring an all-out ground invasion.

Larger ground operations have been launched both north and east of Gaza City. Israel says many of Hamas’ forces and much of its militant infrastructure, including hundreds of miles (kilometers) of tunnels, are in Gaza City, which before the war was home to over 650,000 people, a population comparable to that of Washington, D.C.

Though Israel ordered Palestinians to flee the north, where Gaza City is located, and move south, hundreds of thousands remain, in part because Israel has also bombarded targets in so-called safe zones. Around 117,000 displaced people hoping to stay safe from strikes are staying in hospitals in northern Gaza, alongside thousands of patients and staff, according to U.N. figures.

The U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, known as UNRWA, says nearly 672,000 Palestinians are sheltering in its schools and other facilities across Gaza, which have reached four times their capacity.

UNRWA head Philippe Lazzarini accused Israel of “collective punishment” of the Palestinians, and of forcing their displacement from northern Gaza to the south, where they are still not safe.

Death toll

The death toll among Palestinians passed 8,300, mostly women and children, the Gaza Health Ministry said Monday. The figure is without precedent in decades of Israeli-Palestinian violence. More than 1.4 million people in Gaza have fled their homes.

Over 1,400 people have died on the Israeli side, mainly civilians killed during Hamas’ initial attack, also an unprecedented figure.

Lazzarini said 64 of the agency’s staff were killed in the past three weeks — the latest just two hours before he addressed an emergency U.N. Security Council meeting, when an agency security official was killed with his wife and eight children.

‘Trapped’ Gazans

Most Gazans “feel trapped in a war they have nothing to do with” and “feel the world is equating all of them to Hamas,” he told the Security Council.

Video circulating on social media showed an Israeli tank and bulldozer in central Gaza blocking the territory’s main north-south highway.

The video, taken by a local journalist, shows a car approaching an earth barrier across the road. The car stops and turns around. As it heads away, a tank appears to open fire, and an explosion engulfs the car. The journalist, in another car, races away in terror, screaming, “Go back! Go back!” at an approaching ambulance and other vehicles.

The Gaza Health Ministry later said three people were killed in the car that was hit.

Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, an Israeli military spokesman, declined to comment on where Israeli forces are deployed. He said additional infantry and armored, engineering and artillery units had entered Gaza and the operations would continue to “expand and intensify.”

The military said troops have killed dozens of militants who attacked from inside buildings and tunnels. It said that in the last few days, it had struck more than 600 militant targets, including weapons depots and anti-tank missile launching positions. Palestinian militants have continued firing rockets into Israel, including toward its commercial hub, Tel Aviv.

Hamas said its fighters clashed with Israeli troops who entered the northwest. It was not possible to independently confirm battlefield claims made by either side.

Hospitals under threat

Meanwhile, crowded hospitals in northern Gaza came under growing threat.

Gaza’s Health Ministry shared video footage that appeared to show an explosion and a column of smoke near the Turkish-Palestinian Friendship Hospital for cancer patients. The hospital director, Dr. Sobhi Skaik, said it had sustained damage in a strike that endangered patients.

All 10 hospitals operating in northern Gaza have received evacuation orders, the U.N.’s office for the coordination of humanitarian affairs said. Staff have refused to leave, saying evacuation would mean death for patients on ventilators.

Strikes hit within 50 meters (yards) of Al Quds Hospital after it received two calls from Israeli authorities on Sunday ordering it to evacuate, the Palestinian Red Crescent rescue service said. Some windows were blown out, and rooms were covered in debris. It said 14,000 people are sheltering there.

Israel says it targets Hamas fighters and infrastructure and that the militants operate among civilians, putting them in danger.

Conditions deterioriating

Beyond the fighting, conditions for civilians in Gaza are continually deteriorating.

With no central power for weeks and little fuel, hospitals are struggling to keep emergency generators running to operate incubators and other life-saving equipment. UNRWA has been trying to keep water pumps and bakeries running.

On Sunday, the largest convoy of humanitarian aid yet — 33 trucks — entered the territory from Egypt, and another 26 entered on Monday. Relief workers say the amount is still far less than what is needed for the population of 2.3 million people.

The fighting has raised concerns that the violence could spread across the region. Israel and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah have engaged in daily skirmishes along Israel’s northern border.

In the occupied West Bank, Israel carried out airstrikes Monday against militants clashing with its forces in the Jenin refugee camp. Hamas said four of its fighters were killed there. As of Sunday, Israeli forces and settlers have killed 123 Palestinians, including 33 minors, in the West Bank, half of them during search-and-arrest operations, the U.N. said.

Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi during an interview with the Qatari state-owned news television network Al-Jazeera in Tehran on October 28, 2023.
| Photo Credit: AFP

Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi on Sunday said Israel’s ongoing bombardment of Gaza “may force everyone” to act in the latest warning issued by the Islamic republic since the start of the Israel-Hamas conflict.

Israel has been intensifying strikes on the tiny Palestinian territory since Hamas gunmen stormed across the border on October 7 and, according to Israeli officials, killed more than 1,400 people, most of them civilians.

Since then, more than 8,000 people have been killed, half of them children, according to the Health Ministry in Hamas-run Gaza, an impoverished strip of land which is home to 2.4 million people.

“The crimes of the Zionist regime have crossed the red lines, and this may force everyone to take action,” Mr. Raisi said on X, formerly Twitter, on Sunday.

“Washington asks us to not do anything, but they keep giving widespread support to Israel,” he said.

“The U.S. sent messages to the Axis of Resistance but received a clear response on the battlefield,” he said, using a term often used by Iranian officials to refer to the Islamic republic and its allies like Lebanon’s Hezbollah, Yemen’s Huthis and other Shiite forces in Iraq and Syria.

Although it was not immediately clear what he was referring to, there have been a string of attacks on U.S. forces in Iraq and Syria as well as increasing exchanges of fire between Hezbollah and Israeli forces on the Lebanon border since the Gaza conflict began.

Iran, which financially and militarily backs Hamas, hailed the October 7 attacks as a “success”.

But it has insisted it was not involved in the onslaught, during which 230 people were also taken hostage, according to Israeli authorities.

“Iran considers it its duty to support the resistance groups, but … the resistance groups are independent in their opinion, decision, and action,” the Iranian president said in an interview with Al Jazeera on Saturday, according to excerpts released by state news agency IRNA.

“The United States knows very well our current capabilities and knows that they are impossible to overcome,” he said.

Faced with sharp criticism from allies and opposition alike, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on October 29 apologized for an earlier statement in which he blamed the security services for failing to prevent the Hamas attack on October 7.

“I was wrong. The things I said following the press conference should not have been said and I apologize for that,” Mr. Netanyahu said in a post on X, shortly after deleting his original statement on the same social media platform.

“I give full backing to all the heads of the security services. I am sending strength to the [IDF] chief of staff and the commanders and soldiers of the IDF who are on the frontlines and fighting for our home,” the Israeli prime minister further said.

Late Saturday night, Mr. Netanyahu in a post on X said that he never received any warnings of Hamas’ “war intentions” at any stage, and stressed that “all the security services, including the head of military intelligence and the head of the Shin Bet, were of the opinion that Hamas was deterred and wanted to come to a settlement”.

His comments evoked sharp criticism following which it was deleted.

Also read | Israel-Hamas war, Day 23 LIVE updates

At a press conference on Saturday evening, reporters repeatedly asked the Israeli prime minister if he accepted responsibility for the failure, a question he evaded saying that there would be a thorough enquiry about it after the War and everyone would have to give answers, “including me”.

Several security chiefs have accepted responsibility for the massive failure, but Netanyahu, Israel’s longest-serving prime minister who has been at the helm of affairs since 2009 except for a brief 13-month gap, has desisted from taking any blame for it.

The spokesman for the Israeli Army, Daniel Hagari, tried to brush aside the controversy, saying “I will not answer that question. We are now in a war and are focused on it”.

“We in the IDF and Shin Bet will conduct a thorough investigation of the truth and present everything to the public,” Hagari was quoted as saying in the local media.

“Now we are fighting and focused on the war,” he emphasised.

Netanyahu’s ally National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir criticised the Prime Minister for the post but said that this was not the proper time “for an accounting”.

“The problem isn’t specific warnings, but rather the entire mistaken concept. The policy of containment, the imaginary deterrence, and buying temporary quiet for an exorbitant price” are the root of the entire problem, Ben Gvir said in a post on X, referring to Netanyahu’s post.

Ben Gvir, the leader of the far-right Otzma Yehudit party, however, said that such a discussion “is not for now,” but that there will be “a lot of time afterwards for an accounting”.

Opposition Leader Yair Lapid said that the prime minister has “crossed a red line” by blaming the security and defence services.

“While IDF soldiers and commanders are fighting valiantly against Hamas and Hezbollah, he is trying to blame them instead of backing them up,” Mr. Lapid wrote on X.

“Such attempts to evade responsibility and place the blame on the security establishment weakens the IDF while it is fighting Israel’s enemies,” he said, demanding, “Netanyahu must apologize for his words”.

National Unity chairman and former Defence Minister Benny Gantz, who joined Netanyahu’s government to boost war preparation efforts, called on the Prime Minister to retract his comments.

“This morning in particular I want to back and support all the security forces and IDF soldiers, including the IDF chief of staff, the head of military intelligence, the head of the Shin Bet,” Mr. Gantz said.

“When we are at war, leadership needs to be responsible, to decide to do the right things and support the [security] forces in a way in which they can carry out what we demand of them. Any other action or comment harms the resilience of the people and its forces,” he asserted.

“The Prime Minister must retract his comments from yesterday and stop dealing with this issue,” Mr. Gantz stressed.

Meanwhile, the IDF intensified attacks on Hamas bases in Gaza, saying that it struck some 450 targets belonging to the organisation over the past day.

The targets included Hamas command centres, observation posts, and anti-tank guided missile launch positions, the IDF said.

The Israeli army also expanded ground operations in the Gaza Strip overnight, reinforcing with additional troops.

More than 1400 Israelis were killed and around 230 were taken hostage when Hamas carried out a dastardly attack infiltrating several communities in the south of Israel.

The health ministry in Gaza run by Hamas has claimed that more than 8,000 people have been killed in the coastal Strip since Israel launched a retaliatory campaign to eliminate the militant group.

Jerusalem:

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday took a jab at his intelligence chiefs on the X platform, saying they never warned him Hamas was planning its wide-scale attack on Oct. 7, but later retracted his comments and issued an apology.

The remarks, posted on X at 1 a.m. on Sunday (around 2300 GMT on Saturday), caused a political uproar and a rift within the war cabinet of Netanyahu, who has drawn public ire for not taking responsibility over intelligence and operational failures relating to Hamas’ rampage through southern Israel.

While top officials – from the heads of the military and the Shin Bet domestic spy service to his finance minister – have all acknowledged their failures, Netanyahu has not.

He has only said that there would be time to ask tough questions, including of himself, after the war.

Israel’s military spokesperson, asked about Netanyahu’s comments during a daily briefing with reporters, declined to respond, saying: “We are now at war, focused on the war.”

Israeli officials have said events leading up to and including the handling of the Hamas attack itself would be investigated, but that the current focus was on the conflict.

Netanyahu’s now-deleted post had said: “At no time and no stage was a warning given to Prime Minister Netanyahu regarding war intentions of Hamas. On the contrary, all security officials, including the head of army intelligence and the head of the Shin Bet, estimated that Hamas was deterred and interested in an arrangement.”

In a second post on X about 10 hours later, Netanyahu wrote: “I was wrong,” adding that his remarks “should not have been made and I apologize for that.”

“I give full backing to all the heads of the security branches,” he said.

Netanyahu’s initial comments were promptly rebuked by current and past allies, including Benny Gantz, a former defense minister who is now in Netanyahu’s war cabinet.

Gantz said on X that Netanyahu should retract what he said and let the matter go.

“When we are at war, leadership must show responsibility, decide to do the right things and bolster the forces in a way that they can carry out what we demand of them,” Gantz said.

The well-planned surprise Hamas attack was the deadliest for Israel in its 75-year history. Israel has since bombarded the Gaza Strip with devastating air strikes and begun ground operations with the aim of toppling the Iran-backed Islamist group and securing the release of scores of people abducted from Israel to Gaza on Oct. 7.

Opposition leader Yair Lapid, who was formerly prime minister, said Netanyahu “crossed a red line” with the overnight post.

“The attempts to evade responsibility and place the blame on the security establishment weakens the IDF (Israel Defense Forces) while it’s fighting Israel’s enemies,” he said.

Yossi Cohen, who headed the Mossad spy agency under previous Netanyahu governments, told Israel Radio: “You take responsibility from the beginning of your job, not from the middle.”

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

In the latest war between Israel and Hamas, children were targets on both sides. Israel started its heavy bombardment of Gaza, a tiny Mediterranean land strip of 2.3 million people, on October 7 after Hamas, the Islamist militant group that runs the enclave, carried out an unprecedented cross-border raid, killing at least 1,400 Israelis.

Of the victims, 447 were children and 248 were women, according to Israeli authorities. In retaliation, Israel has cut off food, fuel and power supplies to Gaza, laid siege to the enclave and started bombing it disproportionately. Israel’s President Isaac Herzog suggested there are no innocent civilians in Gaza. In the Israeli attacks, in 22 days, at least 7,700 people were killed, some 70% of them women and children.

According to Gaza’s Health Ministry, the toll includes more than 3,500 minors. The Israeli attacks have also turned more than a million people refugees. Israel ordered one million people living in northern Gaza to move towards the south. Since children make up half of Gaza’s population, they are the hardest hit age category by the displacement as well.

Now that Israel launched its ground invasion, many more Palestinians will be killed, wounded and displaced, which means many more children would be victimised.

PM Narendra Modi has spoken with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi and exchanged views on the deteriorating security and humanitarian situation in West Asia. File
| Photo Credit: ANI

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has spoken with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi and exchanged views on the deteriorating security and humanitarian situation in West Asia.

After his telephonic conversation with Mr. Sisi, PM Modi said that “we share concerns regarding terrorism, violence and loss of civilian lives”.

In a post on X, PM Modi said on Sunday, “Yesterday, spoke with President @AlsisiOfficial. Exchanged views on the deteriorating security and humanitarian situation in West Asia.” “We share concerns regarding terrorism, violence and loss of civilian lives. We agree on the need for early restoration of peace and stability and facilitating humanitarian assistance,” he said.

A statement issued by the Egyptian side said President El-Sisi received a phone call from Prime Minister Modi and the two leaders exchanged views on the latest developments in the Israeli military operations in the Gaza Strip.

They also discussed the gravity of the continuation of the current escalation, given its formidable impact on the lives of civilians and the threat it poses to the security of the entire region, the statement said.

Spokesman for the Egyptian Presidency, Counselor Ahmed Fahmy, said President El-Sisi confirmed that Egypt is pursuing its endeavours to coordinate regional and international efforts to push towards reaching a ceasefire.

The President warned of the grievous humanitarian and security repercussions of a ground offensive in the Gaza Strip, the statement said.

He underscored the critical need for unified international action to find a prompt solution at the diplomatic level, which stipulates reinforcing an immediate humanitarian truce that protects the lives of civilians and allows the instantaneous, sustainable and unfettered delivery of humanitarian assistance to the Gaza Strip, in accordance with the resolution of the U.N. General Assembly in this regard, which was adopted on October 27, it said.

President El-Sisi and Prime Minister Modi expressed relief at the outstanding level of the two countries’ bilateral relations and strategic partnership, the statement said.

They stressed their determination to continue to lead the two countries’ institutions to further strengthen joint cooperation between Egypt and India, the statement issued by the Egyptian side said.

Protesters are arrested and led away by law enforcement at Grand Central Terminal during a rally calling for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas on October 27, 2023, in New York.
| Photo Credit: AP

Hundreds of protesters filled the main concourse of New York city’s famed Grand Central Terminal during the evening rush hour on October 27, chanting slogans and unfurling banners demanding a cease-fire as Israel intensified its bombardment of the Gaza Strip.

Wearing black T-shirts and saying “Jews say cease-fire now” and “Not in our name,” at least 200 of the demonstrators were detained by New York Police Department (NYPD) officers and led out of the train station, their hands zip-tied behind their backs. The NYPD said the protesters were taken briefly into custody, issued summons and released, and that a more exact number of detentions would be available on October 28.

Some protesters hoisted banners as they scaled the stone ledges in front of leader boards listing departure times. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority asked commuters to use Penn Station as an alternative. After the sit-in was broken up by police, the remaining protesters spilled into the streets outside.

“Hundreds of Jews and friends are taking over Grand Central Station in a historic sit-in calling for a ceasefire,” advocacy group Jewish Voice for Peace said on social media.

The scene echoed last week’s sit-in on Capitol Hill in Washington, where Jewish advocacy groups, including Jewish Voice for Peace and If Not Now, poured into a congressional office building. More than 300 people were arrested for illegally demonstrating.

Israel stepped up airstrikes across the Gaza Strip on Friday, knocking out internet and largely cutting off communication with the 2.3 million people inside the besieged Palestinian enclave. Gaza’s Hamas-run Health Ministry says more than 7,300 people have been killed, more than 60% of them minors and women.

The Israeli military’s announcement it was “expanding” ground operations in the territory signalled it was moving closer to an all-out invasion of Gaza, where it has vowed to crush the ruling Hamas militant group after its bloody incursion in southern Israel three weeks ago. More than 1,400 people were slain in Israel during the attack, according to the Israeli government, and at least 229 hostages were taken into Gaza.

The U.N. General Assembly approved a nonbinding resolution calling for a “humanitarian truce” in Gaza leading to a cessation of hostilities. It was the first U.N. response to Hamas’ surprise October 7 attacks and Israel’s ongoing military response.