Gaza ceasefire in fragile state as 14 killed in 24-hours

Israeli military strikes have killed at least 14 Palestinians in Gaza over the past 24 hours, the enclave's Health Ministry said, as Arab and US mediators work to shore up a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.

Palestinian officials reported that dozens of people have been killed by Israeli fire despite the 19 January truce that halted large-scale fighting in Gaza.

That phase ended in early March, and though both sides have since refrained from all-out war, they have been unable to agree on the next stage of the ceasefire in the Palestinian territory.

Israel's military has claimed its forces have intervened to thwart threats by "terrorists" approaching its troops or planting bombs since the ceasefire took effect.

The ceasefire negotiations are now at an impasse, but the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced that an Israeli delegation is in Egypt to discuss a Gaza hostages deal with senior Egyptian officials.

It comes after Gaza's health ministry said most of the latest deaths took place yesterday when an Israeli airstrike killed nine Palestinians including four journalists in the town of Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza.

The Israeli military claimed six men that it had identified as members of the armed wings of Hamas and the allied Islamic Jihad militant group had been killed in the strike.

It also claimed that some of the militants had operated "under the cover of journalists".

Hamas condemned the attack as "a horrible massacre" and "a blatant violation of the ceasefire".

Salama Marouf, the head of the Gaza government media office, said the military's statement about the incident included the names of people who were not present.

It was based on inaccurate social media reports "without even bothering to verify the facts", Mr Marouf said.

At least four more Palestinians were killed in separate Israeli strikes yesterday, the Gaza health officials said.

This morning an Israeli drone fired a missile at a group of Palestinians in the town of Juhr Eldeek in central Gaza, killing a 62-year-old man and wounding several others, the medics said.

Several others were hurt when an Israeli drone fired a missile towards a group of people in Rafah, they added.

The Israeli military said it was not familiar with the reported drone strikes.

Persistent bloodshed in Gaza underscores the fragility of the three-stage ceasefire agreement mediated by Qatar, Egypt, and the US, which have stepped in to hammer out a deal between Israel and Hamas over how to proceed.

During the first phase of the truce agreement, Hamas released 33 hostages, including eight deceased, while Israel freed around 1,800 Palestinian detainees.

Since then, Hamas has consistently demanded that negotiations for the second phase, which include a permanent end to the war, a complete Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, the reopening of border crossings for aid, and the release of remaining hostages.

Israel, however, seeks to extend the first phase until mid-April and insists that any transition to the second phase must include "the total demilitarisation" of Gaza and the removal of Hamas, which has controlled the territory since 2007.

The war began when Hamas carried out a cross-border raid into southern Israel on 7 October 2023, killing 1,200 people and capturing 251 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.

Israel's retaliatory war in Gaza has killed more than 48,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza health officials, reduced much of the territory to rubble, and led to accusations of genocide and war crimes that Israel denies.