As humanitarian aid and diplomatic efforts for a truce and hostage release gain momentum, Israel’s intensified bombardment of Gaza continued on Sunday. Meanwhile, the sound of sirens could be heard in Tel Aviv.
Israel’s armed forces bombarded Gaza on Sunday, but officials also said diplomatic efforts were expected to resume in coming days towards a truce and hostage release deal.
Air strikes and artillery shelling rained down again overnight on the northern, central and southern area of Gaza, in the more than seven-months-old war sparked by Hamas’s October 7 attack.
Fighting has centered on the far-southern city of Rafah, where Israel has vowed to destroy the last remaining Hamas battalions despite a chorus of international opposition to a ground invasion of the city.
Israel’s assault there from early May led Egypt to shut its side of the Rafah border crossing – but on Sunday, aid trucks from Egypt again rolled into Gaza, this time via the nearby Kerem Shalom crossing.
United States President Joe Biden said Saturday his administration was engaged in “urgent diplomacy to secure an immediate ceasefire that brings hostages home.”
Mediator Egypt was also continuing “its efforts to reactivate ceasefire negotiations,” said AlQahera News, which has links with Egyptian intelligence.
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Bodies pulled from rubble
In recent days, the bodies of seven dead hostages have been retrieved from Gaza, heightening the fear and pain of relatives of the remaining captives.
In Tel Aviv, a crowd of several thousands observed a minute of silence Saturday for those who died in captivity.
“I feared this moment,” Avivit Yablonka, whose brother Chanan was brought back dead from Gaza, told the rally. “I will continue to shout, support, fight and do everything so that all the hostages return home.”
Meanwhile, Hamas said Saturday it had taken at least one Israeli soldier “prisoner” in an ambush in Jabalia camp, but the claim was denied by the Israeli army.
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In the latest fighting, Gaza’s civil defense agency said Sunday it had retrieved six bodies after a house was targeted in a strike on Rafah’s eastern Khirbet al-Adas neighborhood.
Witnesses said Israeli artillery had also targeted central Rafah’s Yibna camp, and that heavy artillery shelling hit the city’s Sooq al-Halal and Qishta neighborhoods.
Elsewhere in Gaza, Israeli air strikes targeted the Nuseirat camp, and witnesses said heavy artillery shelling hit northern Gaza.
Israeli tanks in Gaza City rained heavy gunfire on targets in the Zeitun and Netzarim area, an AFP reporter said.
Israel’s military meanwhile said Sunday the arrival of aid had been stepped up, both via a new US-built pier and through its own land crossings, Kerem Shalom and Erez West.
“This week, after the pier began operating for the first time, a total of 1,806 pallets of food were transferred in 127 trucks to logistics centers of international aid agencies in the Gaza strip,” it said.
“In total, this week, 2,065 humanitarian aid trucks were inspected and transferred through the Kerem Shalom and Erez West crossings, which is almost twice the number of the previous week.”
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Sirens ringing in Tel Aviv
Hamas’s armed wing said Sunday it had fired a “large rocket barrage” at Israel’s commercial hub of Tel Aviv, with the military reporting it had intercepted several.
The Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades said in a post on Telegram that they had targeted Tel Aviv “with a large rocket barrage in response to the Zionist (Israeli) massacres against civilians.”
Israel’s army said at least eight rockets were fired towards central areas of the country from Gaza’s far-southern city of Rafah, where its forces have been battling Palestinian militants.
The military said that “a number of the projectiles were intercepted ” by Israeli air defenses.
An AFP correspondent in the Gaza Strip reported seeing rockets being fired from Rafah.
Rocket sirens blared in Tel Aviv for the first time in months, with an AFP correspondent reported hearing at least three blasts.
With AFP
