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PremiumIsrael-Hamas war LIVE: As the war in the Gaza Strip enters Day 31, thousands of Palestinians have lost their lives due to relentless airstrikes by Israeli forces. On Sunday, the Israel Defense Forces hit two refugee camps in the central Gaza Strip, killing scores of people. Meanwhile, Gaza has lost communications in its third total outage of the Israel-Hamas war. Despite appeals and overseas protests, Israel has continued its bombardment across Gaza, saying it is targeting Hamas and accusing the militant of using civilians as human shields.
The war has stoked wider tensions, with Israel and Lebanon's Hezbollah militant group trading fire along the border.
The UN said about 1.5 million people in Gaza, or 70% of the population, have fled their homes. Food, water, and the fuel needed for generators that power hospitals are running out.
The Israeli military said 29 of its soldiers have died during the ground operation.
Read all the latest updates on the Israel-Hamas war here
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The only operative mill in Gaza remains unable to grind wheat due to a lack of electricity and fuel, the World Food Progamme (WFP) statement reported by Al Jazeera
When bread is available, people queue for long hours in bakeries, where they are exposed to air attacks.
At least 11 bakeries have been hit and destroyed since 7 October, according to the WFP.
Only one of the bakeries contracted by the UN’s food agency, along with eight other bakeries in the southern and central areas, intermittently provides bread to shelters, depending on the availability of flour and fuel.
-PM Modi, Iran president in a telepohonic conversation stressed on need for de-escalation, continued humanitarian aid, early restoration of peace
-In telephonic talks with Iran prezsident, PM Modi expressed concerns on terror incidents, violence, loss of lives in Israel-Hamas conflict
The border authority in Gaza on Monday said that the Rafah border crossing is open only for evacuations by Egyptians and foreigners listed since 1 November.
Reuters reports the authority’s statement added that those who were not listed won’t be able to cross the border as per notification from the Egyptian authorities.
Palestinian Health Ministry says 10,022 people have been killed by Israeli attacks in Gaza since October 7.
Turkey's Hakan Fidan told the US secretary of state that a ceasefire needed to be declared urgently in Gaza, and Fidan also told Blinken that Israel had to be prevented from targeting civilians and displacing people in Gaza
-Reuters
South Africa joins list of Turkey, Jordan, Bolivia, Honduras, Colombia, Chile and Bahrain to have recalled their diplomats from Israel in protest over genocide in Palestine's Gaza. Bolivia also cut all diplomatic ties with Israel following its atrocities in Gaza.
Khumbudzo Ntshavheni, a minister in the president’s office, told a press briefing that all diplomatic staff in Tel Aviv would be asked back to Pretoria for consultations.
“We are… extremely concerned at the continued killing of children and innocent civilians in the Palestinian territories and we believe the nature of response by Israel has become one of collective punishment," Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor told a press conference. “We felt it important that we do signal the concern of South Africa while continuing to call for a comprehensive cessation (of hostilities)".
-US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said he discussed with his Turkish counterpart Hakan Fidan on Monday efforts to expand humanitarian efforts in Gaza
-Blinken says US working 'very aggressively' to get more aid into Gaza
-Blinken said it would be seen in the coming days that humanitarian assistance can expand in significant ways.
European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen says the EU is increasing its humanitarian aid for Gaza by 25 million euros ($27 million).
“By doing so the European Union will spend a total of 100 million euros in humanitarian aid for the civilians in Gaza," von der Leyen tells EU diplomats in Brussels.
-AFP
Al Jazeera has confirmed that Al-Shifa hospital, the largest in Gaza, is hours away from shutting down if there is no fuel allowed into the Gaza Strip.
This throws the fate of some 40,000 evacuees seeking refuge in the hospital, thousands of injured Palestinians and babies in incubators, into the unknown.
Netanyahu and his cabinet decided not to allow fuel into Gaza. They’ve also not given any preconditions on how fuel could enter Gaza.
This has left hospitals with no options to continue operating.
The Israeli Defense Forces have said that they have struck 450 Hamas targets in the past twenty four hours.
Further the death toll in Gaza surged as 9,922 Palestinians were killed in Israeli attacks on Gaza and the occupied West Bank since October 7.
Around 100 British nationals have left Gaza for Egypt via the Rafah border crossing and 14 UK citizens have died in the conflict between Israel and Hamas, a UK government minister said on Monday.
There were also "three British nationals who are unaccounted for", said Energy Security Secretary Claire Coutinho, adding that it did not "necessarily mean that they're hostages, but at the moment we're not sure where they are".
The Israeli army said Monday it had arrested the prominent 22-year-old Palestinian activist Ahed Tamimi during a raid in the occupied West Bank.
"Ahed Tamimi was arrested on suspicion of inciting violence and terrorist activities in the town of Nabi Salih" near the city of Ramallah, an army spokesman told AFP.
"Tamimi was transferred to Israeli security forces for further questioning."
Israeli troops early on Monday had surrounded Gaza City and cut off the northern part of the besieged Hamas-ruled territory as communications lost for several hours across Gaza overnight were being restored.
Troops are expected to enter the city Monday or Tuesday, Israeli media reported, and militants who have prepared for years are expected to fight street by street using a vast network of tunnels. Casualties will likely rise on both sides in the month-old war, which has already killed more than 9,700 Palestinians, according to Gaza's Health Ministry.
A knife-wielding Palestinian assailant stabbed and seriously wounded a female Israeli soldier before being shot dead in annexed east Jerusalem on Monday, police said.
"A terrorist armed with a knife arrived at Shalem police station and stabbed a female soldier... border police forces neutralised the terrorist by shooting," police said in a statement.
Israel-Hamas war LIVE: Amid the ongoing Israel-Hamas war that has now completed a month, Israel Defence Forces spokesperson Jonathan Conricus has said that the Hamas terrorists have made specific efforts to stop Palestinians from moving South.
The IDF spokesperson said that most of the combat operations are going on in Gaza because that is where most of the Hamas has its strong hold.
In a video posted on social media platform X, Conricus said, "Most of the combat operations are going on in northern Gaza. there are still other strikes going on , in other areas as well, but we are focussing on Northern Gaza, because that is where most of the Hamas has its strong hold."
He said that Hamas wants to keep civilians in densely populated areas in order to meet their purposes.
"Now, what we have seen are roadblocks, hamas has made specific efforts to stop Palestinians from moving south, ..they do not want people to evacuate from the north....they want them to stay in a densely populated areas where there is the most serious and difficult fighting ..because they want the civilians on top of their tunnels," Conricus said.
Israel-Hamas war LIVE: China will do its utmost to restore peace in the Palestinian territories as it takes over the presidency of the United Nations Security Council, the foreign ministry said on Monday.
China will build consensus and adopt responsible and meaningful actions as soon as possible to ease the current crisis, ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin told a regular news conference.
Israel-Hamas war LIVE: The French death toll from the Hamas attacks in Israel has risen to 40 deaths, French Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne said on Monday.
Borne also told France Inter radio that there were eight French citizens still missing, with some believed to be hostages.
Four civilians, three of them children, were killed by an Israeli airstrike in south Lebanon yesterday.
Israeli troops and Hezbollah militants and their allies along the tense Lebanon-Israel border have been clashing for almost a month since the start of the Hamas-Israel war.
Also on Sunday, Hezbollah said in a statement that it had targeted an Israeli military vehicle across the border from the Lebanese town of Blida with guided missiles Sunday, killing and wounding members of the crew.
An Israeli was killed on Sunday in an attack by the Lebanese group Hezbollah over the border, Israel's military said.
“Hezbollah continued to attack Israeli military sites and civilian towns, without distinguishing between civilians and military personnel," Israel Defense Forces said.
The US military has acknowledged positioning a nuclear-capable submarine in the Middle East. As per the foreign media reports, the submarine is posted in Egypt's Suez Canal near its Suez Canal Bridge.
US acknowledgment of an Ohio-class submarine location is incredibly rare as they represent part of America's so-called “nuclear triad" of atomic weapons
The US has deployed submarines into the region before and announced its recent presence as tensions were high with Iran.
The UN says that 88 staff members from its Palestinian refugee agency UNRWA have been reported killed since 7 October.
The figure represents “the highest number of United Nations fatalities ever recorded in a single conflict," UN agency said.
Israel's war with Hamas in the Gaza Strip will cost as much as $51 billion, the Calcalist financial newspaper.
The daily estimated that equal to 10% of gross domestic product, was premised on the war lasting between eight to 12 months; on it being limited to Gaza, without full participation by Lebanon's Hezbollah, Iran or Yemen.
Calcalist said half of the cost would be in defence expenses that amount to some 1 billion shekels a day. Another 40-60 billion shekels would come from a loss of revenue, 17-20 billion for compensation for businesses and 10-20 billion shekels for rehabilitation.
(1 Shekel = $ 0.25)
The city of Kiryat Shmona was hit by two rocket barrages on Sunday night, according to the city's municipality. According to the city, a rocket attack damaged a power line, which is why much of the city is without electricity.
The heads of 11 UN agencies and six humanitarian organizations issued a joint plea for an immediate humanitarian cease-fire in Gaza, the protection of civilians, and the swift entry to Gaza of food, water, medicine and fuel. The UN and humanitarian organizations said more than 23,000 injured people need immediate treatment and hospitals are overstretched.
The World Health Organization is "very concerned" about reports of another communications outage in Gaza, the organization's director-general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus wrote on the X platform.
"Without connectivity, people who need immediate medical attention cannot contact hospitals and ambulances. All channels of communication must be restored immediately," Tedros wrote.
Five more UN employees have been killed in Gaza over the past 48 hours, according to the main UN agency.
The additional deaths bring the total number of UN relief agency workers killed in Gaza to 79 since Hamas' October 7 attacks on Israel, United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) said.
Four civilians were killed by an Israeli airstrike in south Lebanon on Sunday evening, including three children, a local civil defense official and state-run media reported. The Israeli military said it had attacked Hezbollah targets in response to anti-tank fire that killed an Israeli civilian. Hezbollah said it fired Grad rockets from southern Lebanon into Israel in response.
The Israeli military carried out expansive airstrikes in Gaza on Sunday evening and ground troops completed their encirclement of Gaza City, slicing the enclave in two as telecommunication services to the Strip appeared to be cut again.
An official with the Hamas terror group, which rules Gaza, said that “for more than an hour, intense bombings have been taking place around hospitals."
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in the occupied West Bank on Sunday. Abbas, who has had no authority in Gaza since Hamas took over in 2007, said the Palestinian Authority would only assume control of Gaza as part of a “comprehensive political solution" establishing an independent state that includes the West Bank and east Jerusalem — lands Israel seized in the 1967 war.
Israeli jets struck a house near a school at the crowded Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip. According to media reports, at least 13 people have been killed so far. The Bureij refugee camp is home to an estimated 46,000 people. Many Palestinians fleeing northern Gaza have stayed in refugee camps and schools as temporary shelters.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reiterated his opposition to a cease-fire in Gaza. "There will be no cease-fire without the return of our hostages," he said.
“We say this to both our enemies and our friends. We will continue until we beat them," he added.
The Israeli military has discovered an extensive stash of weapons in a home in Beit Hanoun in the northern Gaza Strip as it searched the area. It found rifles, grenades, explosives, suicide drones and missiles in the residence, bringing some of the weapons back to Israel to inspect them. The military said that forces had also destroyed a nearby explosives lab.
On Sunday, Palestinian communications company Paltel announced that all of its “communication and internet services" were down once again. Internet-access advocacy group NetBlocks.org confirmed that communications were curtailed across Gaza.
It is the third total communications blackout since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas on 7 October.
Israeli ambassador to the US has called Gaza “the biggest terror complex in the world," with tens of thousands of fighters and rockets, among other weaponry — and 310 miles (500 kilometers) of underground tunnels. Ambassador Michael Hertzog said Israel was making every effort to distinguish between “terrorists and the civilian population" in its war with the Hamas militant group that rules Gaza.
