Closing summary
It’s just passed 7.15am in Gaza City and Tel Aviv and we’re closing this blog now. Our live coverage continues here. Thanks for reading. Here’s a look at the latest major developments:
Israel’s military pounded the Gaza Strip on Friday after the end of the week-long truce. Israel launched more than 200 strikes across the territory over the day, including in the densely populated south, where many civilians have fled. The bombardment was most intense in the southern areas of Khan Younis and Rafah, medics and witnesses were reported as saying. Gaza health officials the strikes killed 184 people and wounded at least 589 others, with most of the dead being children and women. Israel has signalled it is preparing to launch a ground assault into southern Gaza in a significant escalation of the war.
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu appeared to brush aside US calls to pursue a more restrained military campaign as the resumption of hostilities began. Netanyahu said his country’s forces were now “charging forward” and that the plan was for a total military victory.
Israeli shelling killed three people in southern Lebanon on Friday, Lebanon’s state news agency reported, as the end of the truce prompted a resumption of hostilities at the frontier. The Iran-backed Lebanese group Hezbollah, a Hamas ally, later said two of those killed were its fighters. It also said it had carried out several attacks on Israeli military positions at the border in support Palestinians in Gaza. The Israeli army said its artillery struck sources of fire from Lebanon and that air defences had intercepted two launches. The army also said it struck a “terrorist cell”.
The head of the UN children’s agency has warned of a “humanitarian catastrophe” if Israeli bombings in Gaza return to the intensity of before the Israel-Hamas truce. Catherine Russell urged “all parties to ensure that children are protected and assisted” and called for a “lasting humanitarian ceasefire”.
Syrian air defences repelled an Israeli rocket attack against targets near Damascus early on Saturday, Syrian state media reported, saying the defences shot down most of the missiles. It said there were no casualties and “only material damages”, and that the strikes came from the direction of the occupied Golan Heights.
Israel’s military has set out its plan for the “next stage of the war”: dividing Gaza into dozens of numbered “evacuation areas”, a core part of the military’s plan to gradually take control of the southern part of the strip. Under the plan, people in certain numbered districts of Gaza will be told to evacuate before bombing begins, although how much time they will get is not clear. Leaflets were dropped in parts of Khan Younis, where Israel believes Hamas’s leadership is based, warning citizens to evacuate further south to Rafah.
Humanitarian groups said the Israeli warnings would be insufficient because civilians in Gaza were running out of places to evacuate to. Palestinians risked being forced completely out of the territory, they said. Homes in Khan Younis were among the targets struck on Friday hours after the truce expired, and residents were given little, if any, time to flee.
No humanitarian aid has been allowed into Gaza on Friday, including fuel, the head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) has said. The Palestinian Red Crescent Society said Israeli forces told organisations operating at the Rafah crossing that the entry of aid trucks was prohibited “until further notice”.
White House national security spokesperson John Kirby, citing reports from Israel, said Israel had agreed to resume letting truck deliveries through at the urging of the US. But he said truck deliveries would likely be reduced to dozens a day rather than the hundreds of trucks that were getting into Gaza daily during the seven-day pause in fighting that ended on Friday morning.
The families of hostages being held in Gaza have said they are terrified about the safety of their loved ones after the end of the ceasefire. The relatives of some of the remaining 126 Israeli hostages have said they are grappling with feeling joy for those who have been released, while being worried sick for loved ones left behind.
The UN said it deeply regretted the resumption of hostilities in the Gaza Strip, calling the situation “catastrophic”. The body also said it was concerned by suggestions Israel could seek to expand its military offensive inside the Palestinian territory. The UN’s human rights chief, Volker Türk, urged efforts to be redoubled to try to bring about a ceasefire on humanitarian and human rights grounds.
Israel has said it will not renew a visa for a top UN official who helps oversee humanitarian aid for the Gaza Strip and occupied West Bank, a UN spokesperson said. Israel’s foreign ministry last month accused Lynn Hastings, the UN’s deputy special coordinator for the Middle East peace process and UN humanitarian coordinator for the occupied Palestinian territory, of failing to be impartial and objective.
British prime minister Rishi Sunak has described the breakdown of the truce as “deeply disappointing” and issued renewed calls for “sustained humanitarian pauses” in Gaza as he held talks with Israel’s president and the leaders of Egypt, Qatar and Jordan on the sidelines of the Cop28 summit on Friday.
Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) has blamed the Israeli military for what it said was a deliberate attack last month on a convoy that was trying to evacuate people out of Gaza City. In a report that cites several witnesses from the organisation, MSF said “all elements point to the responsibility of the Israeli army for this attack”.
The Biden administration has informed Israel that Washington will impose visa bans in the next few weeks on Israeli extremist settlers engaged in violence against Palestinian civilians in the occupied West Bank, a senior state department official said, in the first sign the US is prepared to publicly distance itself from some of the Israeli government’s actions.
A protester with a Palestinian flag self-immolated on Friday outside the Israeli consulate in Atlanta, Georgia, injuring a security guard who attempted to intervene, authorities said. The protester was reported to be in critical condition.
Updated
A protester in the US is in critical condition after setting themself on fire outside the Israeli consulate in Atlanta, Georgia, Associated Press reports in an update.
A security guard who tried to intervene was also injured.
A Palestinian flag found at the scene was part of Friday’s protest, Atlanta police chief Darin Schierbaum said. Investigators did not believe there was any connection to terrorism and none of the consular staff was ever in danger, he said.
Authorities did not release the protester’s name, age or gender. The person was in critical condition with burn injuries to the body.
Fire officials say the guard who tried to stop the person was burned on his wrist and leg.
Former California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has met relatives of three people seized by Hamas in Israel and now held in Gaza, lending his celebrity to support those whose loved ones are still unaccounted for following the 7 October attack, Reuters reports.
Schwarzenegger gave bronze eagle sculptures to his visitors at a video production company in Santa Monica, just west of Los Angeles, on Friday. In turn they presented Schwarzenegger with “Bring Them Home” dog tags.
Declaring himself “a big friend of the Jewish people and Israel”, Schwarzenegger said he wanted to amplify the message not to abandon those who remained captive.
Israel said on Friday that 136 hostages remained in Gaza.
Among those meeting the Terminator star was Bar Rudaeff, 27, whose father Lior Rudaeff, 61, was taken from the Kibbutz Nir Yitzchak. He said Schwarzenegger was one of his father’s favourite actors.
I remember watching a Terminator movie with him in the living room. And I know that when he comes back, it will put a smile on his face.
Schwarzenegger also met Jacob Bohbot, 36, whose brother Elkana Bohbot, 34, was taken from the Supernova music festival in Israel near the border with Gaza, and with Ella Shani, 14, whose cousin Amit Shani, 16, was kidnapped in the attack on Kibbutz Be’eri, taken to the Gaza Strip and released on Wednesday.
Ella’s father, Itzik Kozin, was killed in the kibbutz attack.
Updated
Unicef chief warns of 'humanitarian catastrophe' if fighting intensifies
The head of the UN children’s agency has warned of a “humanitarian catastrophe” if Israeli bombings in Gaza return to the intensity of before the Israel-Hamas truce.
Catherine Russell also urged “all parties to ensure that children are protected and assisted” and called for a “lasting humanitarian ceasefire”.
The executive director of Unicef said in a statement that the Gaza Strip “is once again the most dangerous place in the world to be a child” and that “more children will surely die” as a result of the resumption in fighting.
Russell’s comments on Friday came after the seven-day ceasefire between Israel and Hamas expired and Israel resumed military operations in the territory.
All children in the State of Palestine and Israel deserve peace and hope for a better future.
— Catherine Russell (@unicefchief) December 1, 2023
We call on all parties to ensure that children are protected and assisted.
My statement on the resumption of fighting in Gaza ▶️ https://t.co/jcbyOAEZVS
Russell said:
Before the pause, more than 5,300 Palestinian children were reportedly killed in 48 days of relentless bombing – a figure that does not include many children still missing and presumed to be buried under rubble.
Should violence return to this scale and intensity, we can assume that hundreds more children will be killed and injured every day. And if we are not able to get water, food, medical supplies, blankets and warm clothes to those in need, we will face a humanitarian catastrophe.
Updated
Israeli airstrikes hit near Damascus, says Syria
More has come in on the reported Israeli strikes in Syria: an Agence France-Presse journalist in the Syrian capital reports hearing the loud sound of bombings.
Syria’s defence ministry said Israel carried out the airstrikes about 1.35am (1035 GMT) on Saturday “targeting some points near the city of Damascus”. The strikes came from the direction of the occupied Golan Heights, it said, reporting no casualties.
Syria state television earlier said there had been “Israeli aggression near the capital”, AFP reports.
Israel has launched hundreds of airstrikes on its northern neighbour since Syria’s civil war began in 2011, primarily targeting Iran-backed forces and Lebanese Hezbollah fighters, as well as Syrian army positions.
But it has intensified attacks since its war with Hamas, a Hezbollah ally, began in October.
The Israeli army did not comment when asked by AFP about the latest strikes.
Rami Abdel Rahman, who heads the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor, said Israel struck “Hezbollah targets” in the Sayyida Zeinab area south of Damascus.
Ambulances had rushed to the scene of the bombing, said the chief of the British-based monitor, which runs a network inside Syria.
Israeli air strikes on 26 November rendered Damascus airport inoperable just hours after flights resumed following a similar attack the month before.
Israel rarely comments on individual strikes targeting Syria, but has repeatedly said it will not allow arch-foe Iran to expand its presence there.
Updated
184 killed since resumption of fighting, Gaza authorities say
Gaza health officials say Israeli air strikes have killed 184 people and wounded at least 589 others since the truce expired on Friday morning.
More than 20 houses had been hit, Reuters reports the officials as saying on Friday evening.
The Gaza health ministry said earlier that most of those killed were children and women.
The figures cannot be independently verified.
Israel’s bombardment on Friday after the collapse of the seven-day ceasefire was most intense in the southern areas of Khan Younis and Rafah, medics and witnesses said.
Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians have been sheltering there because of fighting in the north.
Houses in central and northern areas were also hit.
The International Monetary Fund has announced it will revise its economic outlook for the Middle East and North Africa region due to the continuing Israel-Hamas war.
The conflict would have wide-ranging consequences for “both people and economies” in the region, although the extent of the impact remains “highly uncertain”, IMF staff wrote in a blog post on Friday.
A large-scale conflict would constitute a major economic challenge for the region.
The post also called on the international community to act to prevent a further escalation, Agence France-Presse reports.
In the event of a large-scale conflict, “what is certain is that forecasts for the most directly exposed economies will be downgraded and that policies to buffer economies against shocks and preserve stability will be critical”, the IMF post added.
It did not say if the revisions would be released ahead of its next outlook publication, which is due in January.
Syrian air defences repelled an Israeli rocket attack against targets in the vicinity of Damascus early on Saturday, Syrian state media reported, adding that defences shot down most of the missiles.
The report, citing a military source, said the attack came from the direction of the occupied Golan Heights.
It said there were only material damages, Reuters reported.
Israeli shelling in south Lebanon kills three, Lebanese media says
Israeli shelling killed three people in southern Lebanon on Friday, Lebanon’s state news agency reported, as the collapse of a Israel-Hamas truce prompted a resumption of hostilities at the frontier.
The number rose after two people were earlier reported killed.
The Iran-backed Lebanese group Hezbollah, a Hamas ally, later said two of those killed were its fighters. It also said it had carried out several attacks on Israeli military positions at the border in support Palestinians in Gaza, Reuters reports.
The Israeli army said its artillery struck sources of fire from Lebanon and that air defences had intercepted two launches. The army also said it struck a “terrorist cell”.
Sirens warning of possible incoming rockets sounded in several towns in northern Israel, sending residents running for shelter.
Lebanon’s state news agency reported that two people were killed by Israeli shelling in the Lebanese border town of Houla, and one person was killed in the village of Jebbayn.
This is Adam Fulton picking up our live coverage of the Israel-Hamas war – stay with us for all the latest developments as they unfold
Updated
Summary of the day so far
It’s 2am in Gaza City and Tel Aviv. Here’s a recap of the latest developments:
Israel’s military pounded the Gaza Strip on Friday after the end of a seven-day truce. Israel launched more than 200 strikes across the Gaza Strip on Friday, including in the densely populated south, where many civilians have fled. Khan Younis, which was previously attacked less heavily than the north of Gaza, was almost bombed from the air immediately after the truce broke down. Israel has signaled that it is preparing to launch a ground assault into southern Gaza in a significant escalation of the war. Gaza’s health ministry said 178 civilians had been killed since the ceasefire ended.
Israel’s military has set out its plan for the “next stage of the war”: dividing Gaza into dozens of numbered “evacuation areas”, a core part of the military’s plan to gradually take control of the southern part of the strip. Under the plan, people in certain numbered districts of Gaza will be told to evacuate before bombing begins, although how much time they will get is not clear. Leaflets were dropped in parts of Khan Younis, where Israel believes Hamas’s leadership is based, warning citizens to evacuate further south to Rafah.
Humanitarian groups said the Israeli warnings would be insufficient because civilians in Gaza were running out of places to evacuate to. Palestinians risked being forced completely out of the territory, they said. Homes in Khan Younis were among the targets struck on Friday hours after the truce expired, and residents were given little, if any, time to flee.
No humanitarian aid has been allowed into Gaza on Friday, including fuel, the head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) has said. The Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) said Israeli forces told organisations operating at the Rafah crossing that the entry of aid trucks is prohibited “until further notice”. A spokesperson for the crossing said the entrance of trucks carrying much-needed aid, fuel and cooking gas from Egypt into the Gaza Strip had stopped because of Israeli bombardment.
The resumption of hostilities came as the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, appeared to brush aside US calls to pursue a more restrained military campaign. Netanyahu said his country’s forces were now “charging forward” and that the plan was for a total military victory. In a difficult meeting on Thursday, US secretary of state Antony Blinken clashed with the Israeli cabinet and insisted the level of civilian casualties had to be reduced in any resumed assault and that Israel had to share its long-term objectives for Gaza with moderate Arab states.
The families of hostages being held in Gaza have said they are terrified about the safety of their loved ones after the end of the ceasefire. The relatives of some of the remaining 126 Israeli hostages have said they are grappling with feeling joy for those who have been released, while being worried sick for loved ones left behind.
The UN said it deeply regretted the resumption of deadly hostilities in the Gaza Strip, calling the situation “catastrophic”. The body also said it was concerned by suggestions Israel could seek to expand its military offensive inside the Palestinian territory. The UN’s human rights chief, Volker Türk, urged efforts to be redoubled to try to bring about a ceasefire on humanitarian and human rights grounds.
Israel has said it will not renew visa for a top UN official who helps oversee humanitarian aid for the Gaza Strip and occupied West Bank, a UN spokesperson said. Israel’s foreign ministry last month accused Lynn Hastings, the UN’s deputy special coordinator for the Middle East peace process and UN humanitarian coordinator for the occupied Palestinian territory, of failing to be impartial and objective.
Rishi Sunak has described the breakdown of the truce as “deeply disappointing” and issued renewed calls for “sustained humanitarian pauses” in Gaza as he held talks with Israel’s president and the leaders of Egypt, Qatar and Jordan on the sidelines of the Cop28 summit on Friday.
Two people were killed during Israeli shelling in southern Lebanon on Friday, according to reports, as the end of a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas prompted a resumption of hostilities at the border. Hezbollah said it had carried out several attacks on Israeli military positions at the border.
Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) have blamed for what it called was a deliberate attack last month on a convoy that was trying to evacuate people out of Gaza City. In a report that cites several witnesses from the organisation, MSF said “all elements point to the responsibility of the Israeli army for this attack.”
Israel’s military was aware of Hamas’ plan to launch an attack on Israeli soil more than a year before the bloody 7 October terror attack, according to a New York Times report. The document was reportedly circulated widely among Israeli military and intelligence officials, who dismissed the plan as being of a scale and ambition that was beyond Hamas’s capabilities.
The Biden administration has informed Israel that Washington will impose visa bans in the next few weeks on Israeli extremist settlers engaged in violence against Palestinian civilians in the occupied West Bank, a senior state department official said, in the first sign that the US is prepared to publicly distance itself from some of the Israeli government’s actions.
A protester with a Palestinian flag self-immolated on Friday outside the Israeli consulate in Atlanta, US, injuring a security guard who attempted to intervene, authorities said.
'Terrified' children, women and men of Gaza 'have nowhere safe to go', says UN aid chief
The UN aid chief, Martin Griffiths, has said “hopes were dashed” in a matter of hours after the truce between Israel and Hamas came to an end on Friday morning.
In a statement, Griffiths said during seven days of the ceasefire, hostages were released, families were reunited, more patients received medical care, and the volume of aid into Gaza increased. But, he said:
Today, in a matter of hours, scores were reportedly killed and injured. Families were told to evacuate, again. Hopes were dashed.
Almost two months into the fighting, the children, women and men of Gaza are all terrified. They have nowhere safe to go and very little to survive on. They live surrounded by disease, destruction and death.
He urged a humanitarian ceasefire to maintain aid deliveries into Gaza and to allow the remaining hostages to be released. “We need the fighting to stop” he said.
The past week offered us a glimpse of what can happen when the guns fall silent. The situation in Khan Younis today is a shocking reminder of what happens when they don’t.
A Democratic congressman says his home was vandalized on Thursday night by “people advocating for a ceasefire in Israel and Gaza”.
Adam Smith, a US House member from Washington state, called the vandalism to his home in the city of Bellevue “sadly reflective of the coarsening of the political discourse in our country, and is completely unwarranted, unnecessary, and harmful to our political system”.
Smith, the ranking Democrat on the House armed services committee, has not joined calls from some in his party for a ceasefire and was part of a group that sent a letter to Joe Biden applauding the president’s support for Israel.
Smith said he and his staff have often met with groups across the political spectrum, including pro-Palestinian activists. And he said he was still willing to meet with those groups “in a productive and peaceful way”.
“The extremism on both the left and right side of our political spectrum is a threat to a healthy, functioning democracy and has been condoned for far too long,” Smith said in a statement.
The simple truth is that extremism on both sides is degrading to our political system and must be rooted out for our democracy to be able to persist.
Pramila Jayapal, also a Democratic House member from Washington state, wrote on X that vandalizing someone’s home “crosses the line”.
“As an activist before coming to Congress, as a member of Congress who’s been violently targeted at my home, I firmly believe everyone should be able to feel safe in their homes,” Jayapal said.
Let’s find smart, non-violent ways to air our differences & respect the boundaries of home & family.
US and Israeli officials believe that Hamas continues to hold several civilian women as hostages in Gaza, according to a report.
The women are believed to be in their 20s and 30s and many of them were kidnapped from the Nova music festival, CNN reported, citing sources.
The report says that Hamas has insisted during negotiations on Thursday and in the hours after fighting resumed that it did not have any more non-military female hostages to release. The militant group claimed some of the remaining women were considered part of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), it said.
IDF spokesperson Rear Adm Daniel Hagari has said there are 17 women and children among the 136 hostages.
As we reported earlier, the White House has also cast doubt on Hamas claims to have run out of female and child hostages. National security spokesperson John Kirby, at a briefing on Friday, said:
We think it’s more than plausible that they have more women and children that do and should qualify for an exchange.
Doctors Without Borders says all elements of convoy attack in Gaza 'point to Israeli army responsibility'
Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) have said that “all elements” of an attack on one of its convoys while evacuating from Gaza City earlier this month “point to the Israeli military as responsible.”
Two people were killed when an MSF evacuation convoy came under fire in Gaza City on 18 November, in what the organisation said immediately appeared to be a deliberate attack.
In an earlier statement, MSF said the convoy of five cars, all clearly marked with MSF identification and composing of 137 people, including 65 children, was trying to evacuate its Palestinian staff members and their families to southern Gaza. It said that the evacuation convoy was not allowed to cross a checkpoint near Wadi Gaza, and that it was attacked as it returned to the MSF premises.
The organisation released a new statement on Friday saying that “two weeks later, after collecting the testimonies of MSF staff who were present in the convoy that day, all elements point to the responsibility of the Israeli army for this attack.”
It said it has requested a formal explanation from Israeli authorities and called for an independent investigation into the incident.
Israeli defence sources say they expect a southern campaign to take longer than the north, running into January or longer, although timescales in war can be hard to predict.
But while it may proceed gradually, and avoid a certain number of civilian casualties if the evacuations go ahead as planned, it will inevitably leave more and more people pushed south around Rafah.
“Where can people move to?” asked Jason Lee, Palestine country director for Save the Children.
Will they end up pushed next to the Mediterranean, and in the sea?
It raises the grim prospect of fighting running through December, perhaps punctuated by pauses to allow more hostage releases, and risks increasing tensions between Israel and the international community, in particular with the US.
Antony Blinken, the US secretary of state, said on Thursday that Israel must “minimise further casualties of innocent Palestinians” in future military operations and “avoid further significant displacement of civilians inside of Gaza”.
But it is hard to see how both goals can be achieved, even on Israel’s revised area-by-area strategy, given Israel’s overarching objective to eliminate Hamas as a military and political force in the Gaza Strip.
And for all the emphasis on civilian evacuations, Israel said it struck 200 targets on Friday, including in Khan Younis and Rafah. In practice, its new military strategy does not yet look much different.
A UN spokesperson has confirmed that Lynn Hastings will be replaced as the body’s official helping to oversee humanitarian aid for the Gaza Strip and occupied West Bank.
As we reported earlier, UN spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric said Israeli authorities had informed the body that they would not renew Hastings’ visa.
He has since told Al Jazeera that she will be replaced, adding:
We need to make sure that there’s agreement and everybody is OK with the people that we send.
He added that Israel’s attacks against Hastings, who has been the UN’s deputy special coordinator for the Middle East peace process and the humanitarian coordinator for the Occupied Palestinian Territory for three years, were “unacceptable”.
A protester is in critical condition after setting themselves on fire outside the Israeli consulate in Atlanta, US police have said.
Police believe the person, whom they did not identify, was carrying out “an act of extreme political protest”, police chief Darin Schierbaum said on Friday.
A security guard who attempted to intervene was also injured, authorities said.
Israel has said it will not renew visa for a top UN official who helps oversee humanitarian aid for the Gaza Strip and occupied West Bank, a UN spokesperson said.
Lynn Hastings, a Canadian-born UN official, has served as the body’s deputy special coordinator for the Middle East peace process and UN humanitarian coordinator for the occupied Palestinian territory for nearly three years.
UN spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric told reporters on Friday:
We’ve been informed by the Israeli authorities that they would not renew the visa of Ms Hastings past the due date at some point later this month.
Israel’s foreign ministry last month accused Hastings in a social media post of failing to be impartial and objective.
Meet @UN employee @LynnHastings, the Deputy Special Coordinator, Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator.
— Israel Foreign Ministry (@IsraelMFA) October 26, 2023
According to UN ethics, she is supposed to be impartial and objective, but unfortunately she is neither.
Hastings' dangerous rhetoric endangers innocent Israeli and… pic.twitter.com/yby6YIdSJy
“You’ve seen some very public attacks on Twitter against her which were utterly unacceptable,” Dujarric said, adding that personal attacks on UN staff “is unacceptable and puts people’s lives at risks”.
He stressed that the UN’s secretary general, António Guterres, has full confidence in Hastings.
Updated
No humanitarian aid has been allowed into Gaza today, says UN agency
The head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) has said it is “beyond concerned” that no humanitarian aid has been allowed into Gaza today, including fuel.
UNRWA commissioner general Philippe Lazzarini warned of “very sad days ahead” for the people of Gaza in a social media post. He wrote:
The pause has come to an end. Israeli Forces resumed military operations, many will be displaced including seeking refuge in already crowded UNRWA shelters.
We are beyond “concerned” that NO humanitarian aid has been allowed into #Gaza today including fuel.
— Philippe Lazzarini (@UNLazzarini) December 1, 2023
The pause has come to an end. Israeli Forces resumed military operations, many will be displaced including seeking refuge in already crowded @UNRWA shelters. Very sad days ahead
As we reported earlier, the Palestinian Red Crescent Society has also said Israeli forces have been blocking aid from entering the Gaza Strip via the Rafah crossing.
It said Israel had informed all organizations operating at the crossing that the entry of aid trucks into Gaza “is prohibited, starting from today until further notice”.
A spokesperson for the Rafah border crossing earlier today said the entrance of trucks carrying much-needed aid, fuel and cooking gas from Egypt into the Gaza Strip has stopped because of the resumption of the Israeli bombardment.
The White House’s national security spokesperson, John Kirby, said Israel had blocked trucks from crossing into Gaza on Friday, but that it would now allow some aid to enter at the request of the US government.
Updated
Summary of the day so far
It’s 10.45pm in Gaza City and Tel Aviv. Here’s a recap of the latest developments:
Israel’s military pounded the Gaza Strip on Friday after the end of a seven-day truce. Israel launched more than 200 strikes across the Gaza Strip on Friday, including in the densely populated south, where many civilians have fled. Khan Younis, which was previously attacked less heavily than the north of Gaza, was almost bombed from the air immediately after the truce broke down. Israel has signaled that it is preparing to launch a ground assault into southern Gaza in a significant escalation of the war. Gaza’s health ministry said 178 civilians had been killed since the ceasefire ended.
Israel’s military has set out its plan for the “next stage of the war”: dividing Gaza into dozens of numbered “evacuation areas”, a core part of the military’s plan to gradually take control of the southern part of the strip. Under the plan, people in certain numbered districts of Gaza will be told to evacuate before bombing begins, although how much time they will get is not clear. Leaflets were dropped in parts of Khan Younis, where Israel believes Hamas’s leadership is based, warning citizens to evacuate further south to Rafah.
Humanitarian groups said the Israeli warnings would be insufficient because civilians in Gaza were running out of places to evacuate to. Palestinians risked being forced completely out of the territory, they said. Homes in Khan Younis were among the targets struck on Friday hours after the truce expired, and residents were given little, if any, time to flee.
The resumption of hostilities came as the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, appeared to brush aside US calls to pursue a more restrained military campaign. Netanyahu said his country’s forces were now “charging forward” and that the plan was for a total military victory. In a difficult meeting on Thursday, US secretary of state Antony Blinken clashed with the Israeli cabinet over its military tactics, levels of international support and plans for future governance in Gaza. Blinken insisted the level of civilian casualties had to be reduced in any resumed assault and that Israel had to share its long-term objectives for Gaza with moderate Arab states.
Israel has blocked aid from entering the Gaza Strip via the Rafah crossing on Friday, the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) has said. It said Israeli forces told organisations operating at the border that the entry of aid trucks is prohibited “until further notice”, adding that the move “exacerbates the suffering of citizens” of Gaza. A spokesperson for the Rafah border crossing said the entrance of trucks carrying much-needed aid, fuel and cooking gas from Egypt into the Gaza Strip has stopped because of the resumption of the Israeli bombardment.
The families of hostages being held in Gaza have said they are terrified about the safety of their loved ones after the end of the ceasefire. The relatives of some of the remaining 126 Israeli hostages have said they are grappling with feeling joy for those who have been released, while being worried sick for loved ones left behind.
The UN said it deeply regretted the resumption of deadly hostilities in the Gaza Strip, calling the situation “catastrophic”. The body also said it was concerned by suggestions Israel could seek to expand its military offensive inside the Palestinian territory. The UN’s human rights chief, Volker Türk, urged efforts to be redoubled to try to bring about a ceasefire on humanitarian and human rights grounds.
Rishi Sunak has described the breakdown of the truce as “deeply disappointing” and issued renewed calls for “sustained humanitarian pauses” in Gaza as he held talks with Israel’s president and the leaders of Egypt, Qatar and Jordan on the sidelines of the Cop28 summit on Friday.
Two people were killed during Israeli shelling in southern Lebanon on Friday, according to reports, as the end of a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas prompted a resumption of hostilities at the border. Hezbollah said it had carried out several attacks on Israeli military positions at the border.
Turkey’s Anadolu state news agency said a reporter who worked as a cameraman in Gaza was killed by Israeli airstrikes on Friday. Montaser Al-Sawaf, a freelance cameraman, was killed along with his brother and other family members, the outlet said. The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) said earlier on Friday that at least 57 journalists and media workers had died since the start of the war.
Israel’s military was aware of Hamas’ plan to launch an attack on Israeli soil more than a year before the bloody 7 October terror attack, according to a New York Times report. The document was reportedly circulated widely among Israeli military and intelligence officials, who dismissed the plan as being of a scale and ambition that was beyond Hamas’s capabilities.
The Biden administration has informed Israel that Washington will impose visa bans in the next few weeks on Israeli extremist settlers engaged in violence against Palestinian civilians in the occupied West Bank, a senior state department official said, in the first sign that the US is prepared to publicly distance itself from some of the Israeli government’s actions
Updated
The families of hostages being held in Gaza have said they are terrified about the safety of their loved ones after the end of a seven-day ceasefire.
The relatives of some of the remaining 126 Israeli hostages have said they are grappling with feeling joy for those who have been released, while being worried sick for loved ones left behind.
Shahar Mor Zahiro, whose uncle Avraham Munder, 78, was abducted from the Nir Oz kibbutz on 7 October, said:
I’m sad and worried. The return of the fighting, violence and escalation makes me feel scared. Every time a bomb falls near my uncle, we know he can hear it and we are afraid for his life.
Zahiro’s family are among many who were separated during the Hamas attack. Avraham’s wife, Ruti Munder, 78, their daughter, Keren, and grandson, Ohad Munder-Zichri, nine, were abducted separately and freed on the first day of the ceasefire.
The family has been speaking to other recently freed hostages in an effort to find out the fate of Avraham, who is frail and plagued by health problems.
Zahiro, 52, said it was a “comfort” to discover that Avraham was being held with other people from Nir Oz, including Nili Margalit, a 41-year-old nurse who tended to the captives before her release on Thursday.
“She took care of them, but now they’re left alone, so the situation has got worse in many aspects,” Zahiro said.
Time is not on their side. The hostages don’t have their usual medications and they live in inhumane conditions.
Israel blocking aid into Gaza 'until further notice', says Palestinian Red Crescent Society
Israel has blocked aid from entering the Gaza Strip via the Rafah crossing, the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) has said.
In a series of posts on social media, the PRCS said Israeli forces had informed all organizations operating at the crossing that the entry of aid trucks into Gaza “is prohibited, starting from today until further notice”, adding:
This decision exacerbates the suffering of citizens and increases the challenges facing humanitarian and relief organizations in alleviating the hardships of citizens and displaced persons due to the ongoing aggression on the #Gaza Strip.
🚨 Urgent-PRCS: The Israeli Occupation prevents the entry of aid through the Rafah border crossing.
— PRCS (@PalestineRCS) December 1, 2023
⚠️ Today, Israeli occupation forces informed all organizations and entities operating at the Rafah border crossing that the entry of aid trucks from the Egyptian side to the #Gaza…
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Turkey’s Anadolu state news agency said a reporter who worked a cameraman in Gaza was killed by Israeli airstrikes on Friday.
Montaser Al-Sawaf, a freelance cameraman, was killed along with his brother and other family members during Israeli airstrikes in the Ed-Durc neighbourhood of southern Gaza, his cousin told Anadolu.
Anadolu general director Serdar Karagoz said in a statement:
We are fighting to ensure the safety of our colleagues who are carrying out their duties under extremely difficult conditions in Gaza with great dedication.
He added:
We will continue our fight for those responsible for these attacks to be held accountable under international law.
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) said earlier today that at least 57 journalists and media workers had died since the start of the war.
When war breaks out, journalists are there to bear witness so the world can learn the truth of what’s happening on the front lines.
— Committee to Protect Journalists (@pressfreedom) December 1, 2023
When a journalist is killed, we lose a witness. We lose context. We lose facts. We lose accountability.
CPJ has documented the death of at least… pic.twitter.com/kWe4WFKzYx
The White House national security spokesperson, John Kirby, received news while he was briefing the press that an Israeli spokesperson had said some aid would be allowed back into Gaza, after US requests to resume the flow. He said:
They have reduced the kind of aid that’s going to be allowed in and it’s probably in terms of dozens of trucks versus hundreds of trucks, but that’s a good sign.
At the White House, national security spokesperson John Kirby has cast doubt on Hamas claims to have run out of female and child hostages.
“You have to take with an immense grain of salt anything that Hamas says. We’re dealing with a vicious terrorist organisation,” Kirby said.
We think it’s more than plausible that they have additional women and children, who could and should qualify for an exchange.
Updated
The White House national security spokesperson, John Kirby, was asked whether the resumed Israeli military campaign in Gaza was conforming to US demands that it take more account of civilian casualties.
This is what he said in response:
I’m not going to start the call and play-by-play on their operations. They should speak to their operations. They’re a sovereign country. They make these decisions. They write these plans, they execute them, they should speak to them.
What I can tell you is that we have been clear and consistent since the very beginning about the need to abide by the law of war and to minimise civilian casualties, and to do everything that you can in targeting to make it precise, deliberate, cautious and careful. And as Secretary Blinken has said, we have seen them be receptive to that message.
178 Palestinians killed since truce expired this morning, says Gaza health ministry
The health ministry in the Gaza Strip said 178 Palestinians have been killed since this morning as a result of Israeli airstrikes.
Most of those are children and women, the ministry said in its latest update on Friday. It added that 589 people have been injured.
The Guardian cannot verify these figures.
Updated
US blames Hamas for end of truce, saying group didn't come up with list of hostages to be freed
The White House national security spokesperson, John Kirby, has been talking to reporters about the end of the ceasefire, blaming Hamas for not coming up with a new list of hostages to be released.
Kirby said that the president and his officials would remain “deeply engaged” in efforts to restore the pause in fighting. He said:
There hasn’t been any aid getting in since the pause ended, and the people who suffer the most because of that are the people of Gaza, the Palestinian people. So if Hamas truly, as they claim to, do care about Palestinians, they’ll do what they can to come up with a list of hostages that can be exchanged, so that that aid can continue to flow.
Updated
The United Auto Workers, one of the US’s largest labor unions, has come out in support of a ceasefire in Israel and Palestine.
The UAW is now the largest union to have called for a ceasefire. It represents 400,000 workers in the US and more than 580,000 retired workers.
“I’m proud today to announce that the UAW international has joined the call for a ceasefire in Israel and Palestine,” Brandon Mancilla, UAW director, said at a press conference on Friday outside the White House where protesters have been on hunger strike.
From opposing fascism in WWII to mobilizing against apartheid South Africa and the Contra war, the UAW has consistently stood for justice across the globe. A labor movement that fights for social and economic justice for all workers must always stand against war and for peace.
Ceasefire resolutions among local and national labor unions in the US have been increasing since early October. The American Postal Workers Union, the UE union, the California Nurses Association, the Chicago Teachers Union and several other local unions and worker groups have issued public calls for an immediate and permanent ceasefire.
Updated
Recep Tayyip Erdoğan also used his formal remarks at the Cop28 summit to criticise Israel for its actions in Gaza.
The Turkish president, addressing leaders at the conference in Dubai, said:
While discussing the climate crisis, we cannot ignore the humanitarian crisis unfolding in the Palestinian territories right beside us.
The current situation in Gaza constitutes a war crime and a crime against humanity; those responsible must be held accountable under international law.
South Africa’s president, Cyril Ramaphosa, echoed the sentiment, Reuters reported. He said:
South Africa is appalled by the cruel tragedy that is under way in Gaza. The war against the innocent people of Palestine is a war crime that must be ended now.
Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, told his Emirati counterpart, Sheikh Mohammed Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, that Israel restarting its attacks on Gaza after the breakdown of the truce was “very negative”, according to his office.
The two leaders met on Friday on the sidelines of the Cop28 climate summit in Dubai, where Erdoğan also met the prime ministers of Japan and Italy to discuss Gaza, as well as with his counterpart from Uzbekistan.
A statement from the Turkish presidency’s office reads:
President Erdoğan, who noted that the restarting of clashes was very negative, said Turkey was working to achieve a lasting ceasefire and for humanitarian aid to reach Gaza.
Israel knew of Hamas attack plan more than a year in advance - report
Israel’s military was aware of Hamas’ plan to launch an attack on Israeli soil more than a year before the bloody 7 October terror attack, according to a report.
Israeli officials obtained an approximately 40-page battle plan by Hamas, code-named “Jericho Wall”, that “outlined, point by point, exactly the kind” of attack that led to more than 1,200 people killed in Israel during the devastating Hamas attacks, the New York Times reported.
The translated document, which was reviewed by The New York Times, did not set a date for the attack, but described a methodical assault designed to overwhelm the fortifications around the Gaza Strip, take over Israeli cities and storm key military bases, including a division headquarters.
The report says the document was circulated widely among Israeli military and intelligence officials, who dismissed the plan as being of a scale and ambition that was beyond Hamas’s capabilities. It was unclear if Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, or other top leaders had seen it.
Hamas “followed the blueprint with shocking precision”, the report says.
The Israeli military declined to comment on the NYT report, saying “questions of this kind will be looked into in a later stage.”
Truce breakdown 'deeply disappointing', says Sunak
Rishi Sunak issued renewed calls for “sustained humanitarian pauses” in Gaza as he held talks with Israel’s president and the leaders of Egypt, Qatar and Jordan on the sidelines of the Cop28 summit on Friday.
Speaking at a press conference in Dubai, the UK prime minister said:
The breakdown of the truce today is deeply disappointing, not least because a growing number of hostages were coming home.
He paid tribute to the role of Qatar in helping facilitate the efforts and said he hoped the process could be resumed.
He also called for Israel to take “maximum care” to avoid civilian casualties and said he was opposed to “mass displacement of people”, adding that the UK was exploring options for getting aid to the region by sea.
Speaking to broadcasters earlier, Sunak said:
We’ve been consistent that we want to see sustained humanitarian pauses so that more aid can get in to the people of Gaza but also the hostages can come out. Those are critical ingredients. And, as we’ve said, everyone needs to adhere to the terms of these agreements.
Updated
Rishi Sunak stressed the need to “take all possible measures to avoid civilian casualties” in Gaza as he met with Israel’s president, Issac Herzog, on Friday, Downing Street said.
Sunak also reiterated the UK’s “unwavering support” for Israel’s “fundamental right to defend itself against terrorism”, as the pair met on the sidelines of the Cop28 climate summit in Dubai, it said.
A No 10 spokesperson said the two leaders “discussed ongoing efforts to secure the safe release of all hostages, which remains an urgent priority.”
Sunak also “raised the importance of de-escalating tensions in the West Bank to support longer term peace and security,” they said.
The British prime minister also held talks with the leaders of Egypt, Qatar and Jordan to discuss the conflict. No 10 said:
The discussions were focused on practical steps that can now be taken to both bring about more humanitarian pauses so more hostages can be released, how we can get more aid in as well, while also standing by Israel’s right to self-defence.
The official added that there was “obviously shared disappointment and regret among the leaders” regarding the end of the truce.
Updated
US secretary of state Antony Blinken, speaking to reporters in Dubai, reiterated his country stood in “strong solidarity with Israeli defending itself”.
Blinken, who met with Israeli and Palestinian officials on Thursday during his third trip to the Middle East since the war began on 7 October, said his visit had been focused on getting the hostages out of Gaza, and on getting humanitarian assistance to the people of Gaza.
He said he “made clear” that after the end of the truce that “it was imperative that Israel put in place clear protections for civilians and for sustaining humanitarian assistance going forward”.
He said he seen “plans that Israel has in a multiplicity of ways to do everything possible to protect civilians”, adding:
This is going to be very important going forward. It’s something we’re going to be looking at very closely
US 'intensely focused' on hostage release, says Blinken as he blames Hamas for ending truce
The US remains “intensely focused” on freeing all the hostages held in Gaza despite the end of a ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas, the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, has said.
Blinken, speaking to reporters on Friday before departing from Dubai, where he was attending the Cop28 climate conference, said Hamas bears responsibility for the truce coming to an end. He said:
It’s also important to understand why the pause came to an end. It came to an end because of Hamas. Hamas reneged on commitments it made.
He pointed to the deadly gun attack in west Jerusalem on Thursday in which three Israeli were killed, which Hamas has claimed responsibility for.
Blinken said the US remains “intensely focused” on getting the hostages back. “We’re still at this,” he said.
We’re determined to do everything we can to get everyone home, get them reunited with their families, including pursuing the process that worked for seven days. We had seven days of a pause; seven days of people coming home and being reunited with their families. So, we’re on that almost hour by hour.
Updated
Oxfam has said it “fears for the lives and futures” of the more than two million people in Gaza who “again face death from renewed missiles and bombs, and from starvation and thirst and disease” after the end of the truce.
In a statement on Friday, the organisation said the seven-day ceasefire allowed more than 1,000 aid trucks to enter Gaza, bringing in food, water, blankets and cooking gas to some people.
But “this was never going to be enough considering that 1.8 million people – or 80% of Gaza’s entire population – has already been displaced”, it said.
Describing the end of the humanitarian pause as a “Band-Aid … ripped away from Gaza’s bleeding wound”, it warned of an “unfolding humanitarian catastrophe” in the besieged territory, compounded by the “spectre of further massed forced displacement” of people from Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip.
It said it was “deeply concerned” about plans to create so-called “safe zones” in southern Gaza, describing them as “not logistically feasible” and said they would “contradict Israel’s obligation to allow unfettered humanitarian access”. The statement concludes:
The international community must use all diplomatic efforts to press for a lasting a ceasefire, ensure access to humanitarian aid via Israel and Egypt to all those that need it and secure the release of remaining hostages.
Updated
Israel’s military announced on Friday morning that it was dividing the entirety of Gaza into dozens of numbered blocks as a prelude, it said, to demanding targeted local evacuations in the crowded south of the strip before planned bombing.
It dropped leaflets on to Gaza with a QR code to a website with a map of all the areas and geolocating people within them.
The map divides the besieged enclave into 620 small numbered zones, which it will use to order forced evacuations. The Israeli military has told Gaza residents to “keep following the map carefully” and move to specific places when told “to protect their safety”.
Israel’s Defense Forces waited just four minutes after the truce expired at 7am before restarting bombing, according to one resident of Khan Younis.
An hour later, its military set out its plan for the “next stage of the war”: dividing Gaza into dozens of numbered “evacuation areas”, a core part of the military’s plan to gradually take control of the southern part of the strip.
The military’s plan, canvassed privately this week, is to avoid a repeat of the blanket bombing of the northern Gaza in the crowded south, with sequential, targeted bombing campaigns.
Under the plan, people in certain numbered districts of Gaza will be told to evacuate before bombing begins, although how much time they will get is not clear; homes in Khan Younis were among the targets struck on Friday hours after the truce expired, and residents were given little if any time to flee.
Israel’s military dropped leaflets into Khan Younis on Friday morning, warning people in certain districts to evacuate and that the city was now “a dangerous combat zone” and telling them that people should take shelter in Rafah farther south. It also featured a QR code linked to a website mapping all the numbered districts and asking residents for their device’s location.
Israel’s military remains determined to target Khan Younis because it believes Hamas’s leadership, led by Yahya Sinwar, is based in tunnels underneath the city. “The aim of the phase we are currently in is the destruction of the military capability of Hamas,” said Tamir Hayman, a former IDF major general, who has returned to provide advice to former colleagues. At some point, after a certain level of bombing, a ground operation is anticipated.
However, the new military approach threatens to turn an already desperate humanitarian situation in the crowded south into an utterly dire one. An estimated 2 million people now live in the south, half of whom were evacuated from the north. Jason Lee, Palestine country director for Save the Children, said he visited a shelter in Khan Younis two days ago: “It was designed for 1,000 people, but has 35,000 in it. There are 600 people for every toilet.”
Updated
Two people have been killed during Israeli shelling in southern Lebanon, according to reports, as the end of a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas prompted a resumption of hostilities at the border.
Hezbollah said it had carried out several attacks on Israeli military positions at the border on Friday, Reuters reported.
The Iran-backed Lebanese group released statements claiming five attacks on Israeli military positions at the border, and claimed they were “in support of our steadfast Palestinian people … and its valiant and honourable resistance”.
A senior Hezbollah politician, Hassan Fadlallah, earlier said the group was vigilant and ready after the Hamas-Israel truce ended.
The Israeli army said its artillery struck sources of fire from Lebanon and air defences had intercepted two launches. The army also said it struck a “terrorist cell”.
A woman and her son were killed by an Israeli artillery shell in the town of Houla in southern Lebanon, Hezbollah-affiliated al-Manar TV reported.
Updated
Here are some of the latest images from the newswires from Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, after Israel renewed strikes across the region that health officials in the territory said had killed at least 109 people.
Updated
The Biden administration has informed Israel that Washington will impose visa bans in the next few weeks on Israeli extremist settlers engaged in violence against Palestinian civilians in the occupied West Bank, a senior state department official said.
Antony Blinken, the US secretary of state, in his meeting with Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, and his war cabinet have let them know that the United States will take its own action against an undisclosed number of individuals.
The West Bank, among the territories where Palestinians seek statehood, has experienced a surge of violence in recent months amid expanding Jewish settlements and a nearly decade-old impasse in US-sponsored peacemaking.
Israel’s military has made no secret of the intensity of its bombardment of the Gaza Strip. In the early days of the offensive, the head of its air force spoke of relentless, “around the clock” airstrikes. His forces, he said, were only striking military targets, but he added: “We are not being surgical.”
There has, however, been relatively little attention paid to the methods used by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) to select targets in Gaza, and to the role artificial intelligence has played in their bombing campaign.
The Guardian can reveal new details about the Gospel and its central role in Israel’s war in Gaza, using interviews with intelligence sources and little-noticed statements made by the IDF and retired officials.
The article below also draws on testimonies published by the Israeli-Palestinian publication +972 Magazine and the Hebrew-language outlet Local Call, which have interviewed several current and former sources in Israel’s intelligence community who have knowledge of the Gospel platform.
Meanwhile, away from Gaza, Reuters reports that Spain’s PM, Pedro Sánchez, spoke to the Israeli war cabinet member Benny Gantz today to try to defuse tension between the two countries after comments by Sanchez angered Israel for a second time in a week.
Israel recalled its ambassador to Spain for consultations in Jerusalem on Thursday after Sanchez said he doubted Israel respected international humanitarian law and repeated that military action in the Gaza Strip was not acceptable.
Israel’s foreign minister, Eli Cohen, said Sanchez’s remarks were “outrageous”.
Last week, similar comments by Sanchez and his Belgian counterpart, Alexander de Croo, at the Egyptian-controlled Rafah crossing prompted Cohen to summon the ambassadors of both countries over the remarks that he said repeated “false claims” and “gave terrorism a boost”.
Today, Sanchez said he told Gantz – a former defence minister who joined Netanyahu in an emergency unity government last month – by phone that Israel was “a partner and friend of Spain”.
“Israel has the right to defend itself against this terrorist attack, but I reaffirmed that Spain finds the death of civilians in Gaza unbearable and that Israel must comply with international humanitarian law,” Sanchez said.
He hablado con el ministro Benny Gantz, @gantzbe, a quien he reiterado que Israel es un socio y un amigo de España.
— Pedro Sánchez (@sanchezcastejon) December 1, 2023
Una vez más, he condenado los atentados terroristas de Hamás del pasado 7 de octubre.
España desea la inmediata liberación de todos los rehenes.
Israel tiene…
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Summary
As the time approaches 5pm in Israel and Palestine, here is a roundup of the day’s news so far as active warfare between the two sides has resumed after the ceasefire broke down.
Israel has launched a series of airstrikes after the ceasefire expired at 5am. The bombing appears to have been at its most intense in Khan Younis and Rafah in the south of the Gaza Strip.
The death toll since the resumption of fighting has increased – now standing at 109, Reuters quotes the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry as saying. This figure has not been independently verified by the Guardian.
There are differences between the White House and Israeli government, as Guardian diplomatic editor Patrick Wintour reports disagreements over ultimate objectives, timelines and modus operandi.
An Israeli government spokesperson has said that Hamas must “take the mother of all beatings”. Eylon Levy said that the group had refused to release all kidnapped women. In return, Hamas has blamed Israel for the truce not being renewed.
Aid and food trucks crossing between Egypt and Gaza through the Rafah crossing have halted because of the resuming Israeli bombardment.
Military groups allied to Hamas and Palestine have also responded by firing rockets at Israel. The cities of Ashkelon, Sderot and Beersheba have been targeted.
Politicians from other countries, including France and Germany, have spoken of their disappointment at the ceasefire lapsing – and urged both sides to renegotiate.
Talks brokered by Qatar and Egypt are continuing.
The UN said renewed fighting in Gaza was “catastrophic”. Its human rights chief, Volker Türk, said he was worried by comments from Israeli politicians and military leaders which indicated that the military operations could be expanded. The secretary general, António Guterres, said on X, formerly Twitter, that he “deeply regretted” the resumption of combat.
The Red Cross has said the renewed fighting in Gaza is a “nightmarish situation”. Robert Mardini, its head, said that people and hospitals are at “breaking point”.
Unicef spokesperson, James Elder, said that the airstrikes, including one that landed 50 metres away from a hospital in Gaza, showed that it was a “war on children”.
Updated
Our reporters Emma Graham-Harrison and Jason Burke are in Jerusalem, where they report on the resumption of active warfare between Israel and Palestine after the collapse of the ceasefire.
It took only seconds for the bombs to start falling on Gaza again. The week-long ceasefire ended at 7am local time, and almost immediately the sound of explosions filled the corridors of al-Nasr hospital in the south of the territory.
By mid-morning, 32 people were dead and the already crowded wards of Gaza’s remaining hospitals were struggling with a new influx of patients, according to local reports.
“This is the biggest still functioning hospital in Gaza. It’s at 200%-plus capacity,” said James Elder, a spokesperson for Unicef, in a video on X. “The health system is overwhelmed, it cannot take more children with the wounds of war.”
Hamas has said it has offered to hand over the bodies of a mother and her two sons, who the militant group had taken hostage, back to Israel as part of an attempt to extend the truce with Israel.
Shiri Bibas, her 10-month-old son, Kfir, and his four-year-old brother, Ariel, along with their father, Yarden, have become emblematic of the 7 October attacks due to the age of baby Kfir, Agence France Presse reports.
Earlier this week, Hamas’s armed wing said that Shiri, Kfir and Ariel had been killed in an Israeli bombing before the now-lapsed truce went into effect – a claim Israel’s military has said it is investigating, but has yet to confirm.
Combat between Israel and Hamas resumed in the Gaza Strip on Friday morning after an agreement could not be reached on prolonging the seven-day pause in fighting.
Under the terms of the temporary truce, Hamas had returned scores of Israeli hostages in exchange for the release of more than 200 Palestinian prisoners.
“Throughout the night, indirect negotiations unfolded to extend the truce,” Hamas said in a statement Friday.
“Hamas also offered to transfer the Bibas family’s bodies and release their father for their burial, along with two Zionist detainees,” it added.
Israeli authorities “remained unresponsive”, it said.
The Israeli prime minister’s office meanwhile told AFP “Israel will not address propaganda-based reports coming from Hamas”.
As of Thursday, reports of the deaths of the three Bibas family members remained unconfirmed, according to army spokesman Daniel Hagari.
The army has previously said “Hamas is wholly responsible for the security of all hostages”.
Updated
After Patrick Wintour’s report (see 1:36pm) about the differences between Israel and the US, the White House has released an official statement saying it was continuing to work to get the true extended.
“We continue to work with Israel, Egypt and Qatar on efforts to extend the humanitarian pause in Gaza,” a national security council spokesperson said according to Agence France Press.
Medics and witnesses said the bombing was most intense in Khan Younis and Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, where hundreds of thousands of Gazans have been sheltering from fighting further north. Reuters reports that houses in central and northern areas were also hit.
“Anas, my son!” wailed the mother of Anas Anwar al-Masri, a boy lying on a stretcher with a head injury in the corridor of Nasser hospital in Khan Younis. “I don’t have anyone but you!”
Further south in Rafah, residents carried several small children, streaked with blood and covered in dust, out of a house that had been struck. Mohammed Abu-Elneen, whose father owns the house, told Reuters it was sheltering people displaced from elsewhere.
At the nearby Abu Yousef al-Najjar hospital, the first wave of wounded were men and boys.
The news agency says Gazans told of their fear the bombing of southern parts of the enclave could herald an expansion of the war into areas Israel had previously described as safe.
Leaflets dropped on eastern areas of the main southern city Khan Younis ordered residents of four towns to evacuate – not to other areas in Khan Younis as in the past, but further south to the crowded town of Rafah on the Egyptian border. The leaflets, written in Arabic, said:
You have to evacuate immediately and go to the shelters in the Rafah area. Khan Younis is a dangerous fighting zone. You have been warned.
More than 100 people killed in Gaza, Hamas claims
The death toll since the resumption of fighting has increased again – now standing at 109, Reuters quotes the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry as saying.
It comes as the World Health Organization (WHO) warns Gaza’s health system was on its knees even before the ceasefire ended, with hospitals resembling a “horror movie”.
WHO officials inside Gaza have said the healthcare situation there was already “catastrophic”. Richard Peeperkorn, its representative there, has told reporters: “We are extremely concerned about the resumption of violence.” Already, he said, “the health system in Gaza has been crippled by the ongoing hostilities. It cannot afford to lose more hospitals”.
Updated
AFP has more on the visit of Antony Blinken, the US secretary of state, to Jerusalem, where he has reportedly told Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, that the US is preparing to impose a visa ban on Israeli settlers involved in violence against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank.
Citing an unnamed senior US State Department official, AFP reports that the visa ban could be imposed as early as next week, though the source did not say mow many people would be affected.
Violence has surged in the West Bank in tandem with the war in the Gaza Strip. According to the Palestinian health ministry in the West Bank – occupied by Israel since 1967 – nearly 240 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli soldiers or settlers since 7 October.
And Blinken, on his third trip to the region since the Gaza war began, has urged Israel Thursday to prosecute settlers committing acts of violence against Palestinians.
We’re looking to the Israeli government to take some additional steps to really put a stop to this. And at the same time, we’re considering our own steps.
Updated
The Guardian’s diplomatic editor Patrick Wintour has reported on the schism between Israel and the US, its key backer. He wrote on X, formerly Twitter:
Joe Biden has hitched his wagon to a horse he apparently does not control. According to a Channel 12 leak of Israeli cabinet meeting with Blinken, US and Israel disagreed about modus operandi, political timelines and ultimate objectives.
Blinken: “You can’t operate in southern Gaza in the way you did in the north. There are two million Palestinians there. You need to evacuate fewer people from their homes, be more accurate in the attacks, not hit UN facilities, and ensure that there are enough protected areas [for civilians]. And if not? Then not to attack where there is a civilian population. What is your system of operation?”
IDF chief Herzi Halevi: “We follow a number of principles – proportionality, distinction, and the laws of war. There were instances where we attacked on the basis of those principles, and instances where we decided not to attack, because we waited for a better opportunity”.
Defence minister Yoav Gallant: “The entire Israeli society is united behind the goal of dismantling Hamas, even if it takes months”.
Blinken: “I don’t think you have the credit for that.”
Blinken also reportedly pressed the cabinet over Israel’s plans for a post-war Gaza.
Blinken: “You don’t want the Palestinian Authority on the day after. We understand that. The best way to kill an idea is to bring a better idea. The other states in the region need to know what you are planning”.
Prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu: “As long as I’m sitting in this chair, the Palestinian Authority, which supports, educates and finances terror, will not rule Gaza on the day after Hamas.”
Biden has hitched his wagon to a horse he apparently does not control. According to a Channel 12 leak of Israeli cabinet meeting with Blinken, US and Israel disagreed about modus operandi, political timelines and ultimate objectives.
— Patrick Wintour (@patrickwintour) December 1, 2023
Blinken “You can’t operate in southern Gaza…
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Hamas claims death toll since end of ceasefire is now more than 60 people
The Hamas-run health ministry in the Gaza Strip says more than 60 people have now been killed since the truce ended at 5am GMT, Agence France-Presse reports.
The agency says explosions were audible and a dark column of smoke is rising over northern Gaza. Its journalists on the ground saw, and visited the aftermath, of bombings in Gaza’s north and south. Missiles fired by Palestinian groups towards Israel were also seen.
Updated
A spokesperson for the Rafah border crossing says the entrance of trucks carrying much-needed aid, fuel and cooking gas from Egypt into the Gaza Strip has stopped because of the resumption of the Israeli bombardment, according to Al Jazeera.
The quantity of aid delivered through the Rafah crossing had increased during the week-long truce, though aid officials said it was still far less than what was needed.
Rafah has been the only entry point for humanitarian relief destined for Gaza. Limited deliveries started on October 21, two weeks after the start of the war.
The UK prime minister, Rishi Sunak, flew into the UAE earlier today for the Cop28 climate summit in the country.
He met Qatar’s Emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, at the summit, where they spoke of their “deep regret” that the ceasefire had broken, Reuters reports, quoting Sunak’s office on Friday.
Updated
UN calls renewed fighting in Gaza 'catastrophic'
The United Nations said it deeply regretted the resumption of deadly hostilities in the Gaza Strip on Friday after the end of a truce between Israel and Hamas, calling the situation “catastrophic”.
The body also said it was concerned by suggestions Israel could seek to expand its military offensive inside the Palestinian territory.
Fighting resumed in Gaza immediately after the expiry of a week-long truce, with the first fatalities reported minutes later, according to health officials in the enclave.
“I deeply regret that military operations have started again in Gaza,” UN secretary general António Guterres said on X.
The UN’s human rights chief, Volker Türk, called the resumption of hostilities “catastrophic”.
He urged efforts to be redoubled to try to bring about a ceasefire on humanitarian and human rights grounds.
“Recent comments by Israeli political and military leaders indicating that they are planning to expand and intensify the military offensive are very troubling,” Türk added, Agence France Presse reports.
“The situation is beyond crisis point.”
Turk called for an “immediate end to the violence, the prompt and unconditional release of all remaining hostages, the cessation of firing of indiscriminate rockets and use of explosive weapons with wide-area effects in populated areas.”
“I still hope that it will be possible to renew the pause that was established. The return to hostilities only shows how important it is to have a true humanitarian ceasefire.”
Updated
Hamas to 'take a thumping', according to Israeli government spokesperson
An Israeli government spokesperson has said that Hamas “will now take the mother of all thumpings” after a truce in the Gaza Strip expired and hostilities resumed.
“Unfortunately, Hamas decided to terminate the pause by failing to release all the kidnapped women,” government spokesperson Eylon Levy told a briefing.
“Having chosen to hold onto our women, Hamas will now take the mother of all thumpings.”
Levy said the week-long agreement could have been extended, with the Israeli government having already approved a list of Palestinian prisoners for release. It would have meant the prisoner and hostage exchanges would have continued for another two days.
Hamas said the blame for failure to agree a truce extension lies with Israel which had “persistently” rejected offers of hostage releases.
“Throughout the night, indirect negotiations unfolded to extend the truce, within which we proposed exchanges involving prisoners and elderly people, as well as the handover of bodies of Israeli detainees who lost their lives due to Zionist bombings,” Hamas said in a statement.
Levy said Hamas was still holding 137 hostages, 10 of them aged 75 or older.
That number included 117 males and 20 females, comprising 126 Israelis and 11 foreign nationals: eight Thais, one Nepalese citizen, one Tanzanian and one French-Mexican.
He added that seven people were still listed as missing after the 7 October attacks, when Hamas militants broke through Gaza’s militarised border into southern Israel, killing around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapping about 240, according to an Israeli count.
Israel hit back with a relentless military campaign in Gaza that authorities in the Hamas-ruled territory say has killed nearly 15,000 people, also mostly civilians.
Updated
France has said it regrets the end of a truce between Israel and Hamas, and called for its restoration.
“Rupture of the truce is very bad news, regrettable, because it brings no solution and complicates the resolution of all questions that arise,” the French foreign minister, Catherine Colonna, said on the sidelines of the UN’s Cop28 climate talks in Dubai.
She called a truce resumption “essential”.
The truce led to the release of 80 Israeli hostages in exchange for 240 Palestinian prisoners.
It also saw more aid enter Gaza, where about 80% of the population is displaced and short of food, water and other essentials.
Another 25 hostages, mostly Thais, were freed outside the scope of the truce agreement.
“We ask that the truce be resumed. It’s necessary,” Colonna said. “It’s essential at the same to continue to free hostages who have now been for 55 days in extremely difficult conditions, to enable more humanitarian aid to arrive, and to be able to distribute it inside the Gaza Strip where the civilian population is suffering.”
Updated
Germany’s foreign ministry says the diplomatic efforts must be redoubled to try to restore the truce in Gaza.
In a statement posted on X it said: “We must do everything we can to ensure that the humanitarian ceasefire continues. Both for the remaining hostages, who have been hoping for release for weeks, and for the suffering people in Gaza who urgently need more humanitarian aid.”
It added that a peace effort can only work in the long term if “Hamas’s terror of destruction no longer has a chance to regroup”.
Updated
Death toll rises to 54 in Gaza - reports
The death toll in Gaza since Israel resumed their military operation on Friday morning has risen to 54, according to Palestinian broadcasters.
Palestinian official radio reported the latest figure, according to Reuters. This has not been independently verified by the Guardian.
At least 15 people have been killed in attacks on homes in the Shujayea, Al Jazeera reports.
At least four international activists were detained, their whereabouts unknown, after protesting in front of the Egyptian foreign ministry building in Cairo to demand entry to Gaza.
A group calling themselves International Activists for Free Palestine gathered for the rare demonstration, in an environment where public protest is all but banned. Four members of the group, who reportedly hold Argentinian, Australian, French and American citizenship, were taken inside the foreign ministry building around midday on Thursday, and have not been located since.
“They intended to deliver a letter of demands addressed to the minister of foreign affairs, Sameh Shoukry, requesting the necessary security clearance for a convoy of medics, journalists, lawyers and relief workers to travel to the Rafah border crossing in order to deliver essential humanitarian aid and to relieve exhausted Palestinian workers in their disaster relief efforts,” the group later said in a statement.
The protestors previously came to Cairo as part of a larger gathering calling itself the Global Conscience Convoy, who assembled there several weeks ago intending to travel to the Rafah border crossing in north Sinai which leads into Gaza.
The group said it has repeatedly tried to obtain security clearance for the convoy to enter Sinai and the route to the Rafah crossing, but has been stonewalled by the Egyptian authorities.
Egypt maintains the regular closure of the crossing, allowing only small groups of dual nationals to leave Gaza and the entry of some humanitarian relief, and also bans NGO workers and journalists from entering northern Sinai.
Updated
Resumption of fighting a 'nightmarish situation' for Palestinians - Red Cross
Renewed fighting in Gaza has brought back a “nightmarish situation” for the Palestinian territory, the head of the Red Cross told Agency France Presse on Friday.
Speaking on the sidelines of the UN’s Cop28 climate talks in Dubai, Robert Mardini said “people are at a breaking point, hospitals are at a breaking point, the whole Gaza Strip is in a very precarious state”.
Resumption of fighting brings the people of Gaza “back to the nightmarish situation they were in before the truce took place”, said Mardini.
He noted their “suffering, destruction, fear, anxiety and precarious living conditions”.
Israel’s military said fighter jets were striking Hamas targets in Gaza on Friday, as AFP journalists reported air attacks in the north and south of the territory.
Combat resumed shortly after Israel’s army said it had intercepted a rocket fired from Gaza, the first from the territory since a missile launched minutes into the start of the truce on 24 November.
“There is nowhere safe to go for civilians,” Mardini said, stressing the challenges hospitals and humanitarian organisations are facing.
“We have seen in the hospitals where our teams have been working, that over the past days, hundreds of severely injured people have arrived,” he said.
“The influx of severely wounded outpaced the real capacity of hospitals to absorb and treat the wounded, so there is a massive challenge.”
Updated
Harry Davies and Bethan McKernan are in Jerusalem, and report here on the AI-driven “factory” that increases the number of targets for strikes in Palestine.
Israel’s military has made no secret of the intensity of its bombardment of the Gaza Strip. In the early days of the offensive, the head of its air force spoke of relentless, “around the clock” airstrikes. His forces, he said, were only striking military targets, but he added: “We are not being surgical.”
There has, however, been relatively little attention paid to the methods used by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) to select targets in Gaza, and to the role artificial intelligence has played in their bombing campaign.
As Israel resumes its offensive after a seven-day ceasefire, there are mounting concerns about the IDF’s targeting approach in a war against Hamas that has so far killed more than 15,000 people in Gaza, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory.
The IDF has long burnished its reputation for technical prowess and has previously made bold but unverifiable claims about harnessing new technology. After the 11-day war in Gaza in May 2021, officials said Israel had fought its “first AI war” using machine learning and advanced computing.
You can read more here:
Updated
Here is a dispatch from the Guardian’s defence and security editor Dan Sabbagh in Jerusalem.
Israel’s military announced on Friday morning that it was dividing the entirety of Gaza into dozens of numbered blocks as a prelude, it said, to demanding targeted local evacuations in the crowded south of the strip ahead of planned bombing. It dropped leaflets over Gaza on Friday with a QR code to a website with a map of all the areas and geolocating people within them.
Earlier this week Israeli military sources said they anticipated the next phase of the operation in Gaza to involve an attack on the south, and in particular Khan Younis, where it believes Hamas’s leadership is based, and that Israel’s Defense Forces would call for the local civilian population to relocate on a district by district basis before likely targeting the area with airstrikes and artillery.
Humanitarian groups said on Friday that such a plan to divide and attack the south, where 2 million people are now sheltering, risked stretching Gaza to breaking point. “There is fundamentally nowhere for people to go,” said Danila Zizi, the Palestine country manager for charity Humanity and Inclusion.
• This post was amended on 1 December 2023 to correct the spelling of Danila Zizi’s surname.
Updated
Izz ad-Din al-Qassam, Hamas’s armed wing, has said it launched a barrage of rocket on Ashkelon, Sderot and Beersheba in southern Israel on Friday.
On its Telegram channel, the group said the attack comes “in response to the targeting of civilians”.
The military arm of another Gaza-based armed group, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, also known as al-Quds, said it had targeted cities and towns close to the fence along the strip earlier in the day as a truce ended.
Updated
Air raid sirens have sounded in the southern Israeli settlements of Yad Mordechai and Netiv Hatara, close the Gaza Strip, according to a statement on Telegram by Israel’s Home Front Command responsible for civil defence.
Palestinian fighters had said earlier that they had launched a volley of rockets towards Israel.
Qatar has confirmed that talks are continuing between Israel and Palestine with the aim of the ceasefire resuming.
Its ministry of foreign affairs posted a statement on X, saying: “The state of Qatar expresses its deep regret at the resumption of the Israeli aggression against the Gaza Strip following the end of the humanitarian pause, without reaching an agreement to extend it.
“The state of Qatar is committed, along with its mediation partners, to continuing the efforts that led to the humanitarian pause, and will not hesitate to do everything necessary to return to calm.”
It added: “The ministry stresses that the continued bombing of the Gaza Strip in the first hours after the end of the pause complicates mediation efforts and exacerbates the humanitarian catastrophe in the Strip, and in this context calls on the international community to move quickly to stop the violence.”
It went on to condemn the targeting of civilians, collective punishment and “attempts to forcibly displace citizens of the besieged Gaza Strip”.
Qatar had successfully brokered the agreement a week ago for the ceasefire to come into effect, which saw the release of hostages and prisoners.
Hamas said on Friday morning that Israel refused an offer for the release more hostages and the bodies of an Israeli family killed in airstrikes. This has not been independently verified.
Updated
The al-Quds Brigades, the armed wing of Palestinian Islamic Jihad, said it had attacked Israeli cities and towns on Friday.
In a statement on Telegram, the militant group said it was in response to “crimes against our people”, according to Reuters.
Updated
Death toll in Gaza from Israeli airstrikes rises to 32 - Gaza's Hamas-run health ministry
Thirty-two Palestinians have been killed in Israeli strikes in Gaza since the truce expired on Friday morning, Ashraf Al-Qidra, the spokesperson for Gaza’s health ministry said on Friday, according to the ministry’s Telegram account.
The latest figures, reported by Reuters, follow Israeli jets firing on the Gaza Strip minutes after the truce expired on Friday.
Updated
The Unicef spokesperson James Elder has reported that an airstrike landed about 50 metres away from the “biggest still functioning hospital in Gaza”.
“This hospital simply cannot take more children with the wounds of war,” he says in a video posted on X. He pans briefly to children asleep on the floor of a hospital room. Elder is the chief of communications for Unicef. His post was accompanied with the caption: “Has humanity given up on the children of Gaza?”
“I cannot overstate how the capacity has been reduced in hospitals over the last seven weeks. We cannot see more children with the wounds of war, with the burns, the shrapnel littering their body, with their broken bones. Inaction from those with influence is allowing the killing of children. This is a war on children.”
Updated
Israel’s national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, has said that the Israeli military must “return and crush Gaza with all our might”.
In a post on X this morning, he said: “For the sake of the children who have not yet returned, for the murdered who will no longer return, so that the horrors of 7/10 will never return, we must return and crush Gaza with all our might, destroy Hamas and return to the Strip, without compromises, without deals. at maximum power.”
למען הילדים שעוד לא חזרו, למען הנרצחים שכבר לא יחזרו, כדי שזוועות ה-7.10 לא יחזרו לעולם, חייבים לחזור ולכתוש בעזה בכל הכוח, להשמיד את החמאס ולחזור לרצועה, בלי פשרות, בלי עסקאות. במקסימום עוצמה.
— איתמר בן גביר (@itamarbengvir) December 1, 2023
Updated
While the ceasefire has expired this morning, negotiations brokered by Qatar and Egypt with Israel and Hamas are continuing, Reuters reports.
Qatari and Egyptian mediators have been in contact with both sides since fighting resumed in Gaza on Friday, the source said.
Israel’s president, Isaac Herzog, was seen speaking to the Qatari emir, Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, at the Cop28 climate conference in Dubai.
Updated
Israel has been dropping leaflets into parts of southern Gaza, telling residents to leave.
Associated Press reports that they have been dropped in Khan Younis, a city in the southern part of the Gaza Strip.
The leaflets warn that the city is now a “dangerous battle zone”. So far since the Israeli response to the Hamas terror attack has focused largely on the northern part of the Gaza Strip.
Many had fled the north into the south, taking shelter in areas including Khan Younis.
It comes as fighting has resumed this morning in the Palestinian territory after the ceasefire, which had been in place since 24 November.
Updated
14 Palestinians killed by Israeli srikes since truce expired say Gaza health ministry
Gaza’s health ministry has said 14 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli airstrikes since the truce expired this morning.
Reuters reports the figure provided by the Hamas-run ministry. Al Jazeera journalist Hind Khoudary had earlier said that at least six had been killed in an attack on a house in Rafah and in Khan Younis.
Another seven were also killed in the Maghazi area.
Israel has also been asking residents in certain neighbourhoods of Khan Younis to leave before an expected attack in the area.
“The Israeli forces are dropping leaflets for people in Khan Younis asking them to evacuate to Rafah but they are also targeting Rafah,” Khoudary said.
Updated
Here are images of Antony Blinken boarding a US military plane before his departure from Ben Gurion airport in Tel Aviv on Friday.
On Thursday the US secretary of state had met Israeli and Palestinian officials and called for the temporary truce to be extended, as well as saying any resumption of combat must protect Palestinian civilians.
Blinken had told reporters in Tel Aviv of the seven-day pause in fighting:
Clearly, we want to see this process continue to move forward. We want an eighth day and beyond.
On his third trip to the Middle East since 7 October, Blinken also said the US remained committed to supporting Israel’s right to self-defence, but that Israel must protect civilians if it started major military operations in southern Gaza.
Updated
Israeli airstrikes have hit southern Gaza, including the community of Abassan east of the city of Khan Younis, the Hamas-run territory’s interior ministry said.
Another strike hit a home north-west of Gaza City, it said.
The strikes came as the Israeli military said its fighter jets hit Hamas targets in Gaza as the war resumed in full force after the weeklong truce expired, Associated Press reports.
Loud, continuous explosions were heard coming from Gaza and black smoke billowed from the territory on Friday morning.
In Israel, sirens blared at three communal farms near Gaza, warning of incoming rocket fire, suggesting Hamas had also resumed its attacks.
The Israeli military’s announcement of the strikes came just 30 minutes after the ceasefire expired at 7am (0500 GMT) on Friday.
Earlier Friday, Israel accused Hamas of having violated the terms of the ceasefire.
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said Hamas did not agree to release further hostages, infringing on the terms of the truce, and that Israel remained committed to achieving its objectives as fighting resumed.
Netanyahu’s office said on Friday that Hamas did not release all women captives as agreed and also launched rockets at Israel, Reuters reports.
His office said:
With the resumption of fighting we emphasise the Israeli government is committed to achieving the goals of the war: to free our hostages, to eliminate Hamas and to ensure that Gaza will never pose a threat to the residents of Israel.
Updated
Jason Burke in Jerusalem has filed a full report on the developments this morning:
The first images since the resumption of fighting in Gaza are coming though over the news wires:
Inside the Gaza Strip a journalist reported artillery fire in Gaza City and Israeli warplanes carrying out a series of strikes after the resumption of fighting.
The Agence France-Presse journalist also reported drones could be heard in the air over the south of the territory for the first time since the ceasefire.
The resumption of fighting dashed hopes for an extension of the seven-day truce that had seen a reported 105 hostages and 240 Palestinian prisoners released.
The ceasefire also allowed more aid into the ravaged Gaza Strip.
On Thursday, US secretary of state Antony Blinken had met Israeli and Palestinian officials and called for the pause in hostilities to be extended, as well as saying any resumption of combat must protect Palestinian civilians.
Updated
Israeli military warplanes are now attacking Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip, the Israel Defense Forces has said on social media.
מטוסי קרב של צה"ל תוקפים כעת מטרות של ארגון הטרור חמאס ברצועת עזה. פרטים נוספים בהמשך
— צבא ההגנה לישראל (@idfonline) December 1, 2023
Palestinian media is reporting Israeli military strikes in northern Gaza, Reuters has snapped.
Israel resumes military operations in Gaza after ceasefire expires
The Israeli military has resumed combat against Hamas in Gaza, the military announced, saying Hamas had violated the truce and fired towards Israeli territory, Reuters has snapped.
The deadline for the extension of the seven-day ceasefire expired a short while ago, at 7am (0500 GMT) on Friday.
Shortly after the Israeli military’s announcement, Palestinian media reported that Israeli strikes had occurred in northern Gaza.
In the hour before the truce was set to end, Israel said it intercepted a rocket fired from Gaza.
Further sirens warning of rockets sounded again in Israeli areas near Gaza just minutes before the deadline, the Israeli military said.
There was no immediate comment from Hamas or claim of responsibility for the launches.
Qatar and Egypt have been making intensive efforts to extend the truce following the exchange on Thursday of the latest batch of eight hostages and 30 Palestinian prisoners.
Updated
Deadline for truce extension passes
The deadline for the extension of the truce between Israel and Hamas has passed.
The ceasefire was due to expire a few minutes ago, at 7am (0500 GMT) on Friday.
Neither side has announced an extension to the seven-day pause in fighting.
Updated
On the ceasefire, an adviser to Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel was open to continuing the ceasefire if Hamas committed to further hostage releases.
Israel had previously set the release of 10 hostages a day as the minimum it would accept to pause its assault.
“We’re ready for all possibilities.... Without that, we’re going back to the combat,” Netanyahu adviser Mark Regev said on CNN, Reuters reports.
Before the prior truce was due to expire early on Thursday, Hamas and its ally, the armed wing of Palestinian Islamic Jihad, put their fighters on alert for a resumption of hostilities.
The current truce is due to expire in minutes, with a deadline of 7am (0500 GMT) on Friday for extending it.
Updated
Let’s pull together those latest reports of fighting: Israel’s military said it intercepted a rocket fired from Gaza early on Friday while Hamas-affiliated media reported sounds of gunfire and blasts in the territory’s north.
Reuters reports the developments came shortly before the deadline of 7am (0500 GMT) to extend a seven-day truce was set to expire.
Air raid sirens sounded in Israeli communities near the border with Gaza as the time neared.
Israel’s Kan public broadcaster described the sirens as the first to sound since the truce, which has been extended twice, began on 24 November.
Neither side has announced an extension to the truce.
There was no immediate comment from Hamas or claim of responsibility for the launch.
Israel’s military said its Iron Dome missile defence system had intercepted the projectile.
The Shehab News Agency, which is considered close to Hamas, reported explosions and gunfire could be head in northern Gaza. Other Hamas-affiliated media reported sounds of military and drone aircraft flying over Gaza City.
After two last-minute extensions, the enemies marked the seventh day of a Qatari-mediated truce on Thursday with the exchange of eight hostages and 30 Palestinian prisoners as well as the infusion of more humanitarian aid into the shattered Gaza Strip.
The sounds of gunfire and several explosions were heard in northern Gaza early on Friday, the Shehab News Agency, which is considered close to Hamas, reported on Telegram.
The news agency did not provide details, said Reuters, which was was not immediately able to confirm the report.
A blast was reportedly heard in Sderot, near the northern Gaza border. It was not immediately clear if was the same incident the Israeli military was referring to in saying it had intercepted a rocket launched from Gaza.
Updated
Rocket launched from Gaza intercepted, says Israel
The Israeli military says a launch from Gaza was detected early on Friday and had been intercepted.
The Israel Defence Force also said on X (formerly Twitter) that it was looking into the incident.
בהמשך לדיווח על הפעלת התרעה בעוטף עזה, זוהה שיגור אחד שיורט על ידי לוחמי הגנה אווירית
— צבא ההגנה לישראל (@idfonline) December 1, 2023
It came after the military said rocket sirens sounded early on Friday in Israeli communities near the border with the Gaza Strip, about an hour before the extended truce between Hamas and Israel was due to expire, Reuters reports.
Updated
Rocket warning sirens sound in Israel near Gaza border
Rocket sirens blared early on Friday in Israeli communities near the border with Gaza, the Israeli military said, about an hour before a seven-day truce between Hamas and Israel was due to expire.
Israel’s Kan public broadcaster described the sirens as the first to sound since the ceasefire, which has been extended twice, began on 24 November, Reuters reports.
Neither side has announced an extension to the truce.
There was no immediate comment from Hamas.
The truce is set to expire at 7am (0500 GMT).
Updated
US secretary of state Antony Blinken has had a busy schedule in Israel, meeting a host of senior figures in recent hours.
Met with Israeli Minister @gantzbe to discuss measures to ensure Israel’s safety, release of hostages, and measures to minimize harm to civilians. Also spoke about the need to restore calm along the Blue Line. pic.twitter.com/4auVFAykbR
— Secretary Antony Blinken (@SecBlinken) December 1, 2023
In my meeting with Defense Minister @yoavgallant, I reaffirmed the United States’ support for Israel’s right to protect itself in compliance with international humanitarian law, while urging that Israel take all possible measures to avoid civilian harm. pic.twitter.com/FySUTFQPhb
— Secretary Antony Blinken (@SecBlinken) November 30, 2023
Israeli Minister @yairlapid and I discussed continuing efforts to protect civilians during Israel’s operations and the need to address rising levels of extremist settler violence in the West Bank against Palestinian civilians – to include holding perpetrators accountable. pic.twitter.com/ztvAZYTxcJ
— Secretary Antony Blinken (@SecBlinken) November 30, 2023
Opening summary
Welcome to our continuing live coverage of the Israel-Hamas war. This is Adam Fulton and I’ll be with you for the coming while.
Here’s a summary of the latest developments as it approaches 5.30am in Gaza City and Tel Aviv:
Eight Israeli hostages held in Gaza were released on Thursday. Hamas freed six of the hostages hours after releasing two Israeli women. All were handed over to the Red Cross in Gaza and were being brought to Israel to be taken to hospitals and be reunited with their families, the Israeli military said.
Israel released 30 Palestinians from Israeli jails as part of latest exchange, the Israel Prison Service said early on Friday. News agency images show them being welcomed by jubilant crowds Ramallah in the West Bank.
Hamas is willing to further extend the truce to pause fighting with Israel, a source close to Hamas has told Agence France-Presse. The extension is due to expire early on Friday after a seven-day pause. The source was quoted as saying mediators were making intense efforts to continue the truce. Israel had yet to respond, AFP said.
US secretary of state Antony Blinken said in Tel Aviv on Thursday: “Clearly, we want to see this process continue to move forward.” Blinken also stepped up calls for Israel to comply with international law and spare civilians in the war against Hamas in Gaza.
Three people were killed and 13 injured after two brothers from East Jerusalem shot at people waiting at a bus stop on a main road towards the western edge of the city in the rush hour, local police and medics reported. Hamas’s armed wing, al-Qassam Brigades, claimed responsibility for the attack.
An Israeli military assault into the south of Gaza may lead to 1 million refugees, the head of the UN’s Palestine relief agency, UNRWA, has warned. After a second overnight visit to Gaza, Philippe Lazzarini urged Israel to think through the consequences of an offensive in the south if the temporary truce in the fighting was not extended.
Seventeen Thai hostages freed by Hamas over recent days have landed back in Bangkok, where relatives had gathered at the airport to welcome them home. The latest releases bring the total number of Thai nationals freed to 23, with nine still being held.
Updated
