Fierce battles in Gaza as martyrs' toll soars to 26,637
GAZA, Palestine (AFP) - Deadly fighting and air strikes rocked besieged Gaza on Monday, a day after an attack that killed three US troops in Jordan heightened fears of a wider regional conflict.
The Health Ministry said at least 26,637 people have been killed in the Palestinian territory during the war between militants and Israel. The latest toll includes 215 deaths over the past 24 hours, a ministry statement said, while 65,387 people have been wounded since October 7.
The Israeli army, in its war sparked by Hamas's October 7 attack, said its troops had "encountered and killed dozens of armed terrorists in battles in central Gaza". Ground forces backed by tanks have focused combat operations on the coastal strip's main southern city of Khan Yunis, the hometown of Hamas's Gaza leader Yahya Sinwar.
The almost four-month-old war was sparked by the Hamas attack which resulted in about 1,140 deaths, mostly civilians, in southern Israel, according to an AFP tally of official figures. Militants of Hamas, considered a 'terrorist' group by the United States and European Union, also seized 250 hostages, of whom Israel says around 132 remain in Gaza, including the bodies of at least 28 dead captives.
In the latest efforts to broker a new ceasefire, CIA chief William Burns met top Israeli, Egyptian and Qatari officials in Paris on Sunday, but no breakthrough was reported. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said the talks were "constructive" but pointed to "significant gaps which the parties will continue to discuss this week".
Bitter row over UN aid agency
The Gaza war has forced more than one million Palestinians to flee to the far-southern Rafah area near the Egyptian border, according to the UN, deepening the humanitarian crisis.
Hunger and disease have spread in crowded tent cities where families shelter in makeshift tents against the cold winter rain and mud while fearing more air strikes. Alarm over their plight has heightened amid a bitter row over the main UN aid agency for Palestinians, UNRWA, after Israel charged several of its staff partook in the October 7 attack.
Japan became the latest major donor to freeze funding for the agency that has provided most food, medical and other aid to the 2.4 million people of long-blockaded Gaza.
UN chief Antonio Guterres has pleaded for continued financial support, saying "the dire needs of the desperate populations they serve must be met". Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur for the occupied Palestinian territories, warned that suspending funding "overtly defies" an International Court of Justice order to allow more aid into Gaza.
Israel has argued the UN agency must play no role in post-war Gaza, and Israel's envoy to the UN, Gilad Erdan, charged that funding for it "will be used for terrorism".
