Gaza bleeds on as death toll tops 35,000

Israel sent tanks into eastern Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip early yesterday, after a night of heavy aerial and ground bombardments, as the death toll in the Palestinian enclave exceeded 35,000 people. 

More than seven months into the Israel's war on Gaza, UN chief Antonio Guterres urged "an immediate humanitarian ceasefire, the unconditional release of all hostages and an immediate surge in humanitarian aid" into the besieged Gaza Strip.

"But a ceasefire will only be the start," Guterres told a donor conference in Kuwait. "It will be a long road back from the devastation and trauma of this war."

• Biden says ceasefire possible 'tomorrow' if Hamas frees hostages
• Blinken says Israel lacks 'credible plan' to safeguard Rafah civilians
• UN chief calls for 'immediate' Gaza ceasefire, hostage release  

Later the donors pledged over $2 billion for Gaza at the conference.

As Egyptian, Qatari and US mediation efforts towards a truce appeared to stall, US President Joe Biden said on Saturday a ceasefire could be achieved "tomorrow" if Hamas released the hostages held in Gaza.

AFP correspondents, witnesses and medics said Israeli air strikes pounded parts of northern, central and southern Gaza during the night and into yesterday morning.

The Israeli military said its jets had hit "over 150 terror targets throughout the Gaza Strip" over the past day.

In Rafah, Gaza's southernmost city which sits on the border with Egypt, the Kuwaiti hospital said yesterdat it had received the bodies of "18 martyrs" killed in Israeli strikes over the past 24 hours.

The health ministry in the territory said that at least 63 people had been killed over the last 24 hours, bringing the overall death toll from Israel's bombardment and offensive in Gaza to at least 35,034 people, mostly women and children.

Months after Israel said it had dismantled Hamas's command structure in northern Gaza, fighting has resumed in recent days in Jabalia refugee camp and Gaza City's Zeitun neighbourhood.

Military spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said late on Saturday that "in recent weeks we have identified attempts by Hamas to rebuild its military capabilities in Jabalia, and we are acting to destroy these attempts". He also said there was an operation in Zeitun.

The military yesterday said its troops and tanks were operating in Jabalia after launching an operation overnight.

AFP correspondents reported intense clashes and heavy gunfire from Israeli helicopters in the Zeitun area early Sunday, with medics and witnesses saying troops were fighting in Zeitun as well as Jabalia.

Israel defied international opposition this week and sent tanks and troops into eastern Rafah, effectively shutting a key aid crossing.

On Saturday, the Israeli military expanded an evacuation order for eastern Rafah and said 300,000 Palestinians had left the area.

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, gave a similar estimate of "around 300,000 people" who have fled Rafah over the past week, decrying in a post on X the "forced and inhumane displacement of Palestinians" who have "nowhere safe to go" in Gaza. 

And the UN's human rights chief Volker Turk yesterday warned that the evacuation orders, "much less a full assault", could not be "reconciled with the binding requirements of international law" or two recent rulings by the International Court of Justice on Israel's conduct of the war.

Residents were told to go to the "humanitarian zone" of Al-Mawasi on the coast northwest of Rafah, though aid groups have warned it was not ready for an influx of people.

EU chief Charles Michel said on social media that Rafah civilians were being ordered to "unsafe zones", denouncing it as "unacceptable".

Meanwhile, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday defended a decision to pause a delivery to Israel of 3,500 bombs over concerns they could be used in the Gazan city of Rafah, saying Israel lacked a "credible plan" to protect some 1.4 million civilians sheltering there.

Speaking to ABC News' This Week, Blinken said that Biden remains determined to help Israel defend itself and that the shipment of 3,500 2,000-pound and 500-pound bombs was the only US weapons package being withheld.

That could change, he said, if Israel launches a full-scale attack on Rafah.

Israel began what it termed a "limited" operation in Rafah this week, while the international community has repeatedly condemned the possibility, long-threatened by the Israeli government, of a full-scale ground invasion of the city.

Protests against the war spread to Saturday's Eurovision Song Contest in Sweden, where thousands rallied outside the Malmo Arena condemning Israel's participation.