The Israeli government is under intense public pressure to topple Hamas after its militants stormed through a border fence Saturday and killed hundreds of Israelis in their homes, on the streets and at an outdoor music festival.
In the Gaza Strip, meanwhile, residents are facing ever-growing uncertainty after the territory’s only power plant ran out of fuel and shut down Wednesday. Without power, communication is limited and information is scarce.
Egypt has engaged in intensive talks with Israel and the United States to allow the delivery of aid and fuel through its Rafah crossing point, which remained closed on both sides Thursday. However, Egypt pushed back against proposals to establish corridors out of Gaza, saying an an exodus of Palestinians from the enclave would have grave consequences on the Palestinian cause.
The war, which has claimed at least 2,600 lives on both sides, is expected to escalate.
Here’s what’s happening on Day 6 of the latest Israel-Palestinian war:
TEL AVIV, Israel — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken confirmed Thursday that he will visit Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt following planned trips to Jordan and Qatar. Blinken is set to travel on Friday to Doha where he will talks with senior Qatari officials.
Qatar has ties with Hamas and has in the past served as facilitator in discussions to calm tensions in and around Gaza.
LONDON — Britain’s Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has announced millions of pounds in extra funding to boost security at schools and synagogues and protect them against antisemitic attacks in the wake of Hamas’ attacks in Israel.
Sunak’s office said Thursday that 3 million pounds ($3.7 million) of additional funding will be provided to the Community Security Trust, an organization established to protect British Jews from antisemitic threats. The funding will enable the group to provide more guards in the schools it supports, as well as outside synagogues during prayer times.
The Community Security Trust said it recorded 139 antisemitic incidents in the U.K. over the past four days — a fourfold increase compared to the same period last year.
The funding announcement came after Sunak met with senior officials and police chiefs to discuss security and policing protests and rallies by pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian groups planned across the U.K. this weekend.
JERUSALEM — Israel’s military said Thursday that 247 soldiers have been killed since the start of the war last weekend — an increase from 222 earlier in the day.
The military previously confirmed to The Associated Press that the 222 soldiers had all been identified and their families notified.
BAGHDAD — Iran’s Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian expressed his country’s support for the rights of the Palestinian people, saying that the ongoing war in Gaza will affect the whole region.
Amirabdollahian said there is a need for an end to the “killing of children and civilians in Palestine.”
The Iranian official made his comments Thursday during a meeting with Iraq’s National Security Adviser Qasim al-Araji in Baghdad.
Amirabdollahian’s comments were carried in a statement released by al-Araji’s office.
Al-Araji said demonstrations will be held in different parts of Iraq on Friday in support of the Palestinians.
Iran is a main supporter of Palestinian factions based in Gaza, including Hamas and the Islamic Jihad group.
JERUSALEM — A former Israeli defense official told The Associated Press Thursday that Israel should continue bombarding Gaza for as long as militants remain in the territory, even if it incurs massive casualties to Israeli soldiers.
Yaakov Amidror, a retired General and senior fellow at JINSA, a Washington D.C.-based think tank, said that Israel would “bomb any attempt to build military capability in the in the Gaza Strip for the next hundred years,” raising the specter of an unending military engagement in Gaza.
“We need to crush Hamas to ashes, no matter how many casualties,” Amidror said. “Of course, we will give all means to our soldiers to defend themselves. but I don’t think casualties are the main element in decision-making.”
TEL AVIV — Struggling to speak as they sobbed or choked back tears, families of French-Israeli citizens missing since the Hamas attack began last weekend appealed Thursday for information about their whereabouts and for efforts to bring them back.
“We don’t know if she is dead, if she is in Gaza. We don’t know anything. We haven’t heard anything,’’ Doron Journo, whose 24-year-old daughter Karin Journo disappeared Saturday, said at a news conference in Tel Aviv.
Karin’s sister appealed to French President Emmanuel Macron, saying, ‘’I want my country back. I want my sister back.’’
Batsheva Yahalomi described being kidnapped by militants on motorbikes along with her baby and 12-year-old son Eitan. She and the baby escaped, but she hasn’t seen Eitan since.
Ido Nagar held his 6-month-old child as he pleaded for information about his wife, Celine Ben-David Nagar, 32, who had also been at the music festival. ‘’Bring my wife back to her daughter.’’
The Israeli military said Thursday it had dropped 6,000 bombs on Gaza since the start of the Israel-Hamas war. While Israel says it is striking Hamas targets, many civilians in the pounded strip have been killed. Hospitals and U.N. shelters have also been hit.
The airstrikes have also killed entire families in their homes. Gaza’s Ministry of Health said Thursday that 22 entire families had been killed. An airstrike in the northern city of Jabalia Thursday killed 44 members of the same family, leaving just six survivors.
JERUSALEM — A high ranking Hamas official warned Thursday that any Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip will prove catastrophic for the Israeli army.
“For every action the enemy takes, there is a plan we have,” said Saleh Al-Arouri, the deputy head of the political bureau of Hamas.
Israeli defense officials have yet to order a ground invasion of the pummeled territory, but have been planning for the possibility of it. The military has called over 300,000 reservists into action in preparation.
JERUSALEM — In a meeting with the King of Jordan Thursday, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas gave tempered remarks calling for the end of aggression toward Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, Palestinian state media reported, as Israeli airstrikes pummeled the besieged strip.
“We reject the practices of killing civilians or abusing them on both sides,” said Abbas, who is the head of Palestinian Authority in the occupied West Bank.
In 2007, Hamas violently seized Gaza from the internationally recognized Palestinian Authority.
BUCHAREST, Romania — Several hundred people gathered for a rally in Romania’s capital on Thursday to pledge their support for Israel in what its embassy called the country’s “fight against terrorism.”
Held at a central Bucharest park, many attendees waved Israeli flags and some brandished signs that read: “We stand with Israel.”
Israel’s ambassador to Romania, Reuven Azar, told reporters there that “we are going to tackle this evil, because without tackling this evil, we are all in danger.”
“We are now in a very difficult moment in our history. We’ve been attacked by one of the most ferocious, barbaric, savage forces in the world that is killing innocent civilians, families, babies, children, taking hostages, (and) burning people alive,” he said. “It’s a kind of savagery that we haven’t seen before.”
BRUSSELS — U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Thursday that the U.S. is placing no specific conditions on how Israel uses the American-provided munitions. Israel has a professional military and “we would hope and expect that they would do the right things,” he told reporters at the close of the NATO defense ministers meeting in Brussels.
He was asked if the U.S. would put conditions on the weapon, specifically that they would not be used against civilians. Austin said he would leave it to the Israelis to define their operations.
Austin also said that the U.S. is working to provide Israel whatever it needs, even as America continues to support Ukraine. “The United States can walk and chew gum at the same time.”
Secretary General of the Norwegian Refugee Council Jan Egeland has called for establishing demilitarized zones in Gaza amid unrelenting bombardment by Israel following last weekend’s unprecedented attack by Hamas.
Writing Thursday on X, formerly known as Twitter, Egeland said urgent life-saving support is needed for civilians trapped in Gaza.
“The siege must be lifted,” he wrote. “Defined, safe, and demilitarised zones within Gaza itself must be established & respected by all parties.”
Egeland also called for the international community to facilitate a deal to release all civilians held by both sides, “with immediate release of children, mothers with infants, the wounded & sick.”
JERUSALEM — The chief of staff for Israel’s military, Herzi Halevi, admitted Thursday that the military had failed to protect civilians around the Gaza Strip from Hamas’s unprecedented attack on the country.
“The IDF is responsible for the security of the country and its citizens, and on Saturday morning in the area surrounding the Gaza Strip, we did not,” Halevi said. “We will learn, we will investigate, but now is the time for war.”
TEL AVIV, Israel — After visiting Israel and Jordan, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken will travel on Friday to Doha where he will have talks with senior Qatari officials.
Qatar has ties with Hamas and has in the past served as facilitator in discussions to calm tensions in and around Gaza.
BERLIN – The German government says Chancellor Olaf Scholz has discussed the fate of hostages taken by Hamas with the emir of Qatar.
The emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, was in Berlin on Thursday for a previously scheduled visit. Qatar has been a mediator in the past.
Scholz’s office said the German leader underlined Berlin’s condemnation of Hamas’ attack and Israel’s right to defend itself. It said he stressed that “Hamas has full responsibility for the well-being of the hostages” and called for them to be released “as quickly as possible.”
The statement said Scholz “recognized in this context Qatar’s humanitarian effort” and the two leaders agreed to remain in close contact on the issue.
The hostages include several German-Israeli dual citizens, but Germany hasn’t given a precise figure.
JERUSALEM — Fourteen health facilities have been damaged and 10 health care workers killed in the Gaza Strip by Israeli airstrikes since the Israel-Hamas war broke out, Palestinian health officials said Thursday.
JERUSALEM — At least 1,417 Palestinians have been killed in the Gaza Strip and over 6,200 have been injured since the Israel-Hamas war began, Palestinian health officials said Thursday.
Of the dead, nearly 450 are children and 250 are women.
The war has claimed at least 2,600 lives on both sides since Hamas launched its attack on Israel last Saturday.
TEL AVIV, Israel — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has met with Israeli President Isaac Herzog.
Blinken offered a statement with Herzog that touched on the same themes as his earlier statement with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“There really are two paths before countries in this region and in many ways, countries in this world. But here in the Middle East, there’s the path of integration, cooperation, normalization and equal measures of justice, opportunity, dignity for all peoples, including the Palestinians,” Blinken said.
He added: “Or there’s the path that Hamas has shown to the world these last few days — terror, destruction, nihilism, a path that leads to nowhere for anyone except to the darkest places in our souls.”
JERUSALEM — Every Israeli soldier killed by Hamas militants so far in the latest Israel-Palestinian war has been identified, the Israeli military confirmed Thursday.
A total of 222 Israeli soldiers have died and their families have all been notified, a spokesperson for the military said.
