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Agence France-Presse

Gaza rescuers said at least 80 people were killed in Israeli bombardment across the Palestinian territory on Wednesday, as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke to US envoy Steve Witkoff about the release of hostages.
Negotiations for the release of the captives held in Gaza have been ongoing, with the latest talks taking place in the Qatari capital Doha, where US President Donald Trump was visiting on Wednesday.
Netanyahu’s office said the premier had discussed with Witkoff and his negotiating team “the issue of the hostages and the missing”.
Witkoff later said Trump had “a really productive conversation” with the Qatari emir about a Gaza deal, adding that “we are moving along and we have a good plan together”.

Fighting meanwhile raged in Gaza, where civil defence official Mohammed al-Mughayyir said 80 people had been killed by Israeli bombardment since dawn, including 59 in the north.
Agence France-Presse footage from the aftermath of a strike in Jabalia, northern Gaza, showed mounds of rubble and twisted metal from collapsed buildings. Palestinians, including young children, picked through the debris in search of belongings.
Footage of mourners in northern Gaza showed women in tears as they knelt next to bodies wrapped in bloodstained white shrouds.
“It’s a nine-month-old baby. What did he do?” one of them cried out.
Hasan Moqbel, a Palestinian who lost relatives, said: “Those who don’t die from air strikes die from hunger, and those who don’t die from hunger die from lack of medicine”.
Israel’s military on Wednesday urged residents in part of a Gaza City neighbourhood to evacuate, warning that its forces would “attack the area with intense force”.

From the occupied West Bank, Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas said Wednesday he favoured a “ceasefire at any price” in Gaza, accusing Netanyahu of wanting to continue the war “for his own reasons”.
In a letter addressed to Netanyahu and sent to Trump and Witkoff, 67 former hostages held by Hamas in Gaza urged for a “negotiated deal” for the return of all the captives still held there.
“The majority of Israeli society wants the hostages home – even at the cost of halting military operations,” the letter said.
Mohammad Awad, an emergency doctor in northern Gaza’s Indonesian Hospital, said that supply shortages meant his department could not properly handle the flow of wounded and that “the bodies of the martyrs are lying on the ground in the hospital corridors”.
“There are not enough beds, no medicine, and no means for surgical or medical treatment, which leaves doctors unable to save many of the injured who are dying due to lack of care”, he said.
Israel imposed an aid blockade on the Gaza Strip on March 2 after talks to prolong a January 19 ceasefire broke down.

The resulting shortages of food and medicine have aggravated an already dire situation in the Palestinian territory, although Israel has dismissed UN warnings that a potential famine looms.
Germany’s Chancellor Friedrich Merz on Wednesday urged all sides to avert a famine in Gaza, while Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said the humanitarian situation in Gaza was “ever more dramatic and unjustifiable”.
UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres called for a ceasefire and “unimpeded humanitarian access” to the territory.
A US-led initiative for aid distribution under Israeli military security drew international criticism as it appears to sideline the United Nations and existing aid organisations, and would overhaul current humanitarian structures in Gaza.
Medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres said the plan would make “aid conditional on forced displacement”, adding that Israel was creating “conditions for the eradication of Palestinian lives in Gaza”.
Israel resumed major operations across Gaza on March 18, with officials later talking of retaining a long-term presence in the Palestinian territory.

Following a short pause in air strikes during the release of US-Israeli hostage Edan Alexander on Monday, Israel resumed its pounding of Gaza.
Netanyahu said on Monday that the military would enter Gaza “with full force” in the coming days.
He added that his government was working to find countries willing to take in Gaza’s population.
The Israeli government approved plans to expand the offensive earlier this month, and spoke of the “conquest” of Gaza.
Of the 251 hostages taken during Hamas’ October 2023 attack, 57 remain in Gaza, including 34 the military says are dead.
The attack resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people on the Israeli side, mostly civilians, according to an Agence France-Presse tally based on official figures.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 52,928 people in Gaza, mostly civilians, according to figures from the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry, which the United Nations considers reliable.


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Israel-Gaza war

Gaza rescuers say 80 killed in Israeli strikes

Palestinians inspect the site of an Israeli strike on a house, in Jabalia, in the northern Gaza Strip. Photo: Reuters

People mourn near the bodies at northern Gaza’s Indonesian Hospital. Photo: AFP

Israeli tanks near the Israel-Gaza border in Israel. Photo: Reuters

A damaged car at the site of an Israeli strike in Jabalia, in the northern Gaza Strip. Photo: Reuters

Palestinians inspect the site of an Israeli strike in Khan Younis, Gaza Strip. Photo: AP

Israeli strikes on Gaza kill 15, mostly women and children

A woman during the funeral of Palestinians killed in Israeli strikes in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, on Sunday. Photo: Reuters

Palestinians displaced by the Israeli military offensive, shelter in tents in Gaza City. Photo: Reuters

Palestinians collect water at a distribution point west of Gaza City, on Sunday. Photo: AP

Hamas frees Israeli-American hostage in goodwill gesture toward Trump administration

Released US-Israeli hostage Edan Alexander embraces his brother. Photo: GPO via Reuters

Red Cross vehicles transport Edan Alexander. Photo: AP

The Israeli military helicopter that transported Edan Alexander. Photo: Reuters

Edan Alexander and family members. Photo: Israeli Army via AFP

People watch a live broadcast as Edan Alexander is released from Hamas captivity in Gaza. Photo: AP

Netanyahu vows ‘full force’ offensive in Gaza as Israel plans to relocate Palestinians

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has pledged a full-force Gaza offensive to defeat Hamas. Photo: Reuters

Palestinians salvage items from the rubble of the Fatima Bint Asad school hit in overnight Israeli strikes in Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip on Monday. Photo: AFP

An elderly Palestinian woman reacts to news of relatives following overnight Israeli strikes on the Fatima Bint Asad school in Jabalia, outside the Indonesian Hospital in Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip on Monday. Photo: AFP

UN experts warn of ‘annihilation’ in Gaza as Israeli strikes kill dozens

A Palestinian man reacts following an Israeli strike that hit a Thai restaurant and the nearby area in Gaza City on Wednesday. Photo: AFP

Displaced Palestinians live in a school that has been converted into a shelter in Gaza City on Tuesday. Photo: AP

The World Central Kitchen logo is seen on a pallet of humanitarian aid at the Kerem Shalom border crossing to Gaza on May 1. Photo: Reuters

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World

Middle East

Bombardment intensifies after Israel’s Netanyahu vowed ‘full force’ Gaza offensive


Bombardment intensifies after Israel’s Netanyahu vowed ‘full force’ Gaza offensive.


Gaza rescuers say 80 killed in Israeli strikes

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Bombardment intensifies after Israel’s Netanyahu vowed ‘full force’ Gaza offensive

Bombardment intensifies after Israel’s Netanyahu vowed ‘full force’ Gaza offensive