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Here is where things stand on Saturday 24 May 2025:
- A sense of anger and devastation grows after an Israeli attack killed nine children of Gaza doctor Alaa al-Najjar while she worked at a hospital in Khan Younis.
- More than 70,000 children in Gaza face acute levels of malnutrition as Israel continues to only allow a minuscule amount of aid to enter the devastated territory.
- At least 79 bodies have been brought to hospitals across Gaza in the past 24 hours, the Health Ministry says, with 211 Palestinians wounded.
- Witnesses to Israel’s bombing of a family home in Gaza’s Jabalia refugee camp that left some 50 people dead or missing told Al Jazeera “the Israeli military is killing civilians for fun”.
- Israel’s war on Gaza has killed at least 53,901 Palestinians and wounded 122,593, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry. The Government Media Office updated the death toll to more than 61,700, saying thousands of people missing under the rubble are presumed dead.
- An estimated 1,139 people were killed in Israel during the Hamas-led attacks on October 7, 2023, and more than 200 taken captive.
Palestinians in Gaza ‘want an end to this hell’
Yousef Munayyer, a senior fellow at the Arab Center Washington DC, says it’s been “almost hard to imagine that there could be a level of decimation that is somehow greater than what we have seen” already in Gaza.
However, Munayyer told Al Jazeera that Israel is preparing to inflict “even greater death and destruction” on Palestinians.
“People in Gaza have now survived over a year and a half of nights where they thought that every single night would be their last. They have seen unimaginable scenes of death and destruction,” he said.
“They have smelled the stench of death in an unending way. They want an end to this hell, they want the world to remember that they exist, that they are human, and that they deserve better than this.”
Four-year-old boy dies of starvation in Gaza City: Civil defence
A spokesperson for the civil defence agency in Gaza City told Al Jazeera the boy, named Mohammed Yassin, died from starvation as a result of Israel’s blockade on food, water and other aid to Gaza.
“This is not the first child to die in Gaza as a result of starvation,” Mahmoud Basal said.
“If food and drink are not allowed to reach the people of the Gaza Strip, we will witness many more deaths of these children. We will witness more deaths.”
Basal called on the international community to “act to end this suffering”.
Political pressure rises on Israeli PM Netanyahu
Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu has just appointed a new chief of the security agency Shin Bet who it has been said wants military pressure and escalation in the war on Gaza, and that’s why he was chosen.
But there’s a lot of pressure on Netanyahu internationally in the last couple of weeks to try to get Israel to end the blockade of Gaza and stop the war altogether, and the expanding military operations. The military says all the brigades called up are now operating inside of Gaza.
Family members say the intensified attacks will only kill the remaining captives. But Netanyahu is part of the most right-wing Israeli government in Israel’s history – people who have largely been against any ceasefire deal, largely against any end to the war.
So there are a lot of moving parts politically for Netanyahu. He says he’s only going to end the war if the plan to move all the Palestinians out of Gaza comes into effect. Many in the international community say this amounts to ethnic cleansing.
It doesn’t seem like we’re anywhere near the end of this war.
Israel’s aid plan for Gaza ‘will not succeed’, UNRWA chief says
Israel’s aid delivery plan for Gaza is not only incompatible with basic humanitarian principles, it is unworkable, says the head of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA).
“It is not possible for a humanitarian organisation, which truly respects the basic humanitarian principles, to adhere to such a scheme,” Philippe Lazzarini said in a statement published on UNRWA’s official Facebook page.
“I do not think that such a model will succeed. This model seems also to be put in place in order to support more a military objective than a real humanitarian concern.”
Israel is pushing for a new model of aid distribution in Gaza under the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a US-backed organisation. But the UN says it will not work with the scheme because it is not impartial or neutral and will force more displacement.
Israel has also come under widespread condemnation for allowing a minimal amount of aid into the Strip over the last week after imposing a total blockade on Gaza for nearly three months. According to the WFP, almost Gaza’s entire population is now at risk of severe hunger and famine.
If you’re just joining us
Let’s bring you up to speed on the latest developments:
- The UN’s World Food Programme says more than 70,000 children in Gaza face acute levels of malnutrition, as Israel only allows a minuscule amount of aid to enter the devastated territory.
- The Gaza Government Media Office says hundreds of thousands of tonnes of humanitarian aid have accumulated outside Gaza and “decayed or spoiled” because of months of Israeli obstruction.
- Protesters are rallying in central Tel Aviv to demand the release of Israeli captives still held in Gaza, as pressure mounts on Prime Minister Netanyahu’s government to agree to a deal to end the war.
- A sense of anger and devastation is growing after an Israeli military attack killed nine children of Gaza doctor Alaa al-Najjar while she was working at a hospital in Khan Younis.
Know their names: Dr Alaa al-Najjar’s nine children killed in Israeli attack
As we’ve been reporting, the Israeli attack that killed nine young siblings in southern Gaza continues to spur condemnation and a sense of horror.
The Gaza government media office has released the names and ages of all the children killed.
Here they are:
- Yahya Hamdi al-Najjar, 12
- Rakan Hamdi al-Najjar, 10
- Eve Hamdi al-Najjar, 9
- Jubran Hamdi al-Najjar, 8
- Ruslan Hamdi al-Najjar, 7
- Reval Hamdi al-Najjar, 5
- Sadin Hamdi al-Najjar, 3
- Luqman Hamdi al-Najjar, 2
- Sidar Hamdi al-Najjar, under 1 year old
Saudi foreign minister arrives in Spain for Gaza talks
Saudi Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud has arrived in Spain for talks on the situation in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.
The meeting in Madrid involves the ministerial committee set up by the Joint Arab-Islamic Extraordinary Summit, which brought together the Arab League and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation in Saudi Arabia in November 2023.
The talks will address “the ongoing developments in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, along with international efforts to end the conflict and ease the humanitarian situation in the region”, the Saudi Foreign Ministry said.
Preparations for an upcoming international conference on the two-state solution set to take place at UN headquarters in New York in June will also be discussed. That conference will be co-chaired by Saudi Arabia and France.
Protesters blame Israeli PM for prolonging Gaza war
The family members of captives say they’re not only protesting in Tel Aviv, but across the country, to try and put pressure on the Israeli government to enter into a deal that would see the release of the remaining 58 captives.
But they say the Israeli prime minister is not interested in a deal. They gave a press conference a few hours ago to try and get their message out – not just to the Israeli public but to the world to get people to understand what they’re going through.
They accuse Benjamin Netanyahu of prolonging the war on Gaza for his own personal gain. According to Israeli intelligence, of those 58 abductees, about 20 are believed to be alive, and the rest are deceased.
Israel withholding aid to north Gaza to forcibly displace people, Norwegian Refugee Council says
Israel’s control of aid is “dangerous” and it is denying aid to northern Gaza in an attempt to displace people there, the Norwegian Refugee Council’s spokesperson has said.
“We think that providing aid to one area above another, as opposed to all areas, is a coercive measure to forcibly displace people, which Israel has been doing all [during the war] of course,” Ahmed Bayram told Al Jazeera.
“Israel’s control of aid, whether in part of the whole system, is dangerous and should not be accepted, let alone allowed, by its allies for 81 days,” he added.
“Israel is an occupier in this scenario and it should not control aid provision to people, let alone life-saving aid like food and water.”
Israel’s limited aid policy fuelling more ‘chaos and desperation’ in Gaza, NRC says
Israel’s policy to allow only an extremely limited amount of aid into Gaza is actually causing “chaos and a lot of desperation” that is exacerbating the hardship faced by people over a nearly three-month total blockade, Ahmed Bayram, Middle East spokesperson for the Norwegian Refugee Council, has told Al Jazeera.
“Israel’s drip-drip supply of aid is actually confusing people,” he said, speaking from Amman in Jordan.
“People are waiting for that loaf of bread which Israel has been keeping from them, only for Israel to open the gates and then close them again, allowing in a fraction of what is actually needed.
What we need now is not just that switch to keep flicking on and off, we need Israel to keep the gates open for hundreds, and thousands of trucks to arrive. The siege has been lifted in name only, the blockade has been lifted in name only – particularly in the north [of Gaza], which has received zero aid.”
Bayram said that one kilo of onions now reportedly costs about $50 in Gaza, and that many people are having to improvise by making bread out of lentils or dried ground beans or pasta, or using bug-infested flour, while others are eating leaves and grass to try to stave off starvation.
“I’ve heard from a colleague [in Gaza] saying that if you consume one meal a day now, you’re among the luckiest,” he said, adding that children are particularly vulnerable to dying from starvation or suffering severe physical and psychological damage from acute hunger and malnutrition.
“It’s a childhood taken away from them, and in a lot of cases, they’re dying a slow death, literally, while so much food waits across the border,” Bayram said.
Photos: Israelis rally in Tel Aviv to demand captives’ release
Outrage, horror after Israeli attack kills 9 children of Gaza doctor
An Israeli attack has killed nearly the entire family of a Khan Younis doctor while she was at work, Gaza health officials said.
The attack hit the home of Alaa al-Najjar, a paediatrician at the southern city’s Nasser Hospital, on Friday, setting it ablaze and killing nine of her 10 children.
The UN’s special rapporteur for the Palestinian territory, Francesca Albanese, slammed the attack as part of a “sadistic pattern” of a “new phase of genocide” facing Palestinians in the besieged enclave.
Read the full story here.
Trump must ‘press Netanyahu gov’t to stop starving Palestinians’: US senator
Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren has urged the Trump administration to pressure Israel to open up aid routes and stop its starvation policy “instead of trying to do a Gaza real estate deal”.
Trump previously said he wants the US to “own” Gaza and to force out Palestinians in order to turn the enclave into “the Riviera of the Middle East”.
Palestinians have firmly rejected the US president’s plan, saying it amounts to ethnic cleansing.
Israel reconsiders taking full control over Gaza aid delivery: Report
As pressure mounts to get more aid into Gaza, Israel appears to be changing tack and may let aid groups operating in the battered enclave remain in charge of non-food assistance while leaving food distribution to a newly established US-backed group, according to a letter obtained by The Associated Press.
The development indicates Israel may be walking back from its plans to tightly control all aid to Gaza and prevent aid agencies long established in the territory from delivering it in the same way they have done in the past.
Israel has blocked food, fuel, medicine and all other supplies from entering Gaza for nearly three months, worsening a humanitarian crisis for 2.3 million Palestinians there. Experts have warned of a high risk of famine and international criticism and outrage over Israel’s offensive has escalated.
Australia must take a stronger stance on Israel’s aid blockade on Gaza, Labor MP says
Ed Husic, a lawmaker and former minister with Australia’s governing Labor Party, has criticised the government’s stance on Israel’s blockade on Gaza, and said Australia should have joined the joint statement by the United Kingdom, France and Canada threatening to take “concrete actions” against Israel if it does not lift restrictions on aid.
“Right now, Australia can and should be doing more: for starters, we should be calling in the Israeli ambassador to Australia to express the unequivocal demand we share with other nations that the Israeli government must provide for the immediate freer, rapid flow of humanitarian aid, not the ‘basic’ level currently permitted to trickle in,” Husic wrote for The Guardian.
“[The statement by the UK, France and Canada] is a further sign that many of our good friends in the international community remain aghast at the treatment of innocent civilians in Gaza. It was an important stand by them. Australia could have proudly joined them. We didn’t.”
Husic, who was the minister for industry and science between 2022 and 2025, is the first Muslim to be elected to federal parliament, as well as to become a minister.
Ex-US lawmaker urges Washington to ‘choose humanity’ over destruction, death
Justin Amash, a former member of the US House of Representatives, has shared a message from a cousin in Gaza detailing dire conditions in the enclave.
“I say it frankly, we can no longer live. Help and save the people of Gaza. There is no food – no flour – no clean water – no medicine for treatment – no hospitals,” the message, which Amash shared in a post on X, reads.
Amash said several of his cousins were killed in October 2023 when an Israeli strike destroyed part of a church complex where they had sought shelter. “Many were just beginning their lives,” he wrote.
“Please pray that all parties involved, including the United States, choose peace and humanity instead of more destruction and death.”
‘We are being exterminated’: Trickle of food aid fails to reach northern Gaza
None of the limited food aid that Israel has allowed into Gaza in recent days has reached the north of the Strip.
A local community kitchen in Gaza City is one of the few places where people can find food. However, the kitchen’s supplies are running dangerously low and it will have to shut down in the coming days if it does not receive aid.
Abu Ali, the manager of the community kitchen, told Al Jazeera that about 1,200 people come to the facility looking for food every day, but they are only able to feed about 300.
“What is available in northern Gaza is just lentil soup – no bread or anything else,” he said.
“For us in northern Gaza, we are being exterminated with no food and no flour. Young children show up just to get a bowl of food and we have 15 large pots that barely feed 300 people.”
Deadly Israeli attack latest to target displaced Palestinians in al-Mawasi
Seven Palestinians have been killed in al-Mawasi, and dozens of others have been injured in that attack.
This is not the first time Israeli forces have targeted al-Mawasi.
Al-Mawasi has been designated as a safe, humanitarian zone, and the Israeli army has been asking Palestinians to evacuate to that area.
But there have been continuous attacks on the tents, on the Palestinians who are displaced in that area, and people believe it is not safe, as claimed by Israel’s military.
Death toll in Gaza since dawn rises to 48
At least 48 Palestinians have now been killed in Israeli air attacks on the Gaza Strip since dawn today, the territory’s Health Ministry announced.
How commercial drones turn deadly in Gaza
In Gaza, the sound of drones can be heard everywhere.
An analysis by Al Jazeera’s digital investigations team, Sanad, has revealed that Israel is repurposing commercial drones to use as weapons of war in the Strip.
And as drones become ever more accessible, the line between their civilian use and their military use is becoming increasingly blurred.
Germany’s anti-Semitism commissioner urges debate on Israel stance
The German government’s anti-Semitism commissioner has called for a more honest debate on the country’s stance towards Israel in light of its actions in the Gaza Strip.
Germany sees Israel’s security as a “reason of state” – a phrase alluding to Berlin’s historical responsibility to the state of Israel following the Holocaust.
The concept, like Israel’s right to exist, is essential to Germany’s self-understanding and its relationship with Israel, Felix Klein told the Sunday edition of the national daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung in comments released on Saturday. But, he noted, the term is also vague.
“We must do everything in our power to preserve the security of Israel and Jews worldwide,” he said. “But we must also make it clear that this does not justify everything.”
Starving Palestinians and deliberately worsening the humanitarian situation has nothing to do with securing Israel’s right to exist, he added.
‘Engineered starvation’: Gaza gov’t denounces Israel’s misleading aid narrative
The Government Media Office says hundreds of thousands of tonnes of humanitarian aid have accumulated outside Gaza and “decayed or spoiled” because of months of Israeli obstruction, while the population “faces an escalating famine”.
It noted that during the 84 days of Israel’s total blockade, a minimum of 46,200 aid and fuel trucks should have entered Gaza to meet the basic needs of the population.
However, in recent days, “the occupation has promoted a misleading narrative claiming to allow the entry of ‘aid’ while in reality only about 100 trucks have been permitted”.
That figure represents less than 1 percent of the population’s basic needs, it added.
“This situation clearly reflects the occupation’s policy of ‘engineered starvation’ by which it deliberately controls the flow and distribution of food, further deepening the humanitarian catastrophe affecting more than two million civilians in Gaza,” a statement said.
If you’re just joining us
Let’s bring you up to speed on the latest developments:
- At least 79 bodies have been brought to hospitals across Gaza in the past 24 hours, the Health Ministry says, while 211 injuries have also been confirmed.
- Hamas has condemned an Israeli attack on the Khan Younis home of Dr Alaa al-Najjar that killed nine of her children as a “heinous crime”.
- The UN says at least 938 Palestinians have been killed in the occupied West Bank by Israeli military forces or settlers since the Gaza war began.
- Former UN humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths tells Al Jazeera that what is going on in Gaza is “unequivocally [the] weaponisation of aid to create starvation and children are dying because of it”.
More than 70,000 children facing acute malnutrition in Gaza, WFP says
The World Food Programme says that more than 70,000 children in Gaza face acute levels of malnutrition, as Israel continues to only allow a minuscule amount of aid to enter the devastated territory.
“WFP is taking every opportunity to deliver food and nutrition assistance – but this is just a drop in the bucket,” the United Nations agency posted on X.
“To avert famine and save lives, we need immediate, unrestricted and safe access to deliver.”
Israeli settlers set fire to 4 hectares of wheat crops in West Bank’s Sebastia
Citing local officials, the Wafa news agency reports the settlers set about four hectares (10 acres) of wheat fields ablaze in the village near Nablus in the north of the occupied West Bank.
The head of the Sebastia municipality, Mohammad Azem, told Wafa the settlers came from the illegal settlement of Shavei Shomron and a nearby settlement outpost.
“Azem said the wheat crop was completely destroyed, causing heavy financial losses for the two farmers,” Wafa said.
Palestinians in the West Bank have experienced a surge in Israeli settler and military violence amid Israel’s war on Gaza.
Death toll in Gaza since dawn rises to 44
At least 44 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli air attacks on the Gaza Strip since dawn today, 25 of them in the southern part of the Strip, its Health Ministry announced.
What are Israel’s obligations under international law?
UN chief Guterres has reminded Israel that it has obligations as the occupying power in Gaza, including to ensure that the needs of the occupied Palestinian population are met.
What exactly are Israel’s obligations under international humanitarian law?
The Fourth Geneva Convention, which lays out rules for the protection of civilians during armed conflict, states that an occupying power “has the duty of ensuring the food and medical supplies of the population”.
“It should, in particular, bring in the necessary foodstuffs, medical stores and other articles if the resources of the occupied territory are inadequate,” it says.
Occupying powers also have an obligation “to the fullest extent” possible to maintain medical and hospital establishments. They must also facilitate “relief schemes” if the occupied population does not have access to adequate supplies.
The UN and the world’s top human rights groups have said for months that Israel is not only failing to supply adequate food, water, medicine and other needed supplies to people in Gaza, it is impeding deliveries of humanitarian assistance.
Food shortages leading to miscarriages in Gaza
Gaza’s Government Media Office has registered 300 cases of miscarriages in pregnant women in the enclave due to a lack of food.
At least 58 Palestinians died due to malnutrition and 242 due to lack of food and medicine.
Israel has allowed only a trickle of aid to cross into Gaza this week following a partial easing of its 11-week siege.
‘What did this child do to Netanyahu?’
Wissam al-Madhoun is grappling with the aftermath of an Israeli attack on a house in Khan Younis that killed his sister, her husband and the couple’s two children.
“Suddenly, a missile destroyed the entire house. All of them were civilians,” al-Madhoun told the AFP news agency.
He was among the mourners who gathered around the white-shrouded bodies outside Nasser Hospital.
“We found them lying in the street. What did this child do to Netanyahu?”
Hamas says AP report on human shields shows Israel’s ‘moral collapse’
The testimony of Palestinian victims and Israeli soldiers in a news report by The Associated Press documents “the heinous crimes committed by” Israel, a statement by the group says.
Hamas said the crimes referred to in the report were committed “under explicit orders from senior military leaders”, calling them “war crimes and systematic violations of international law”.
The testimonies “reveal a systematic, deliberate policy that reflects the moral and institutional collapse within the ranks of this terrorist army”, said Hamas.
Troops are routinely forcing Palestinian civilians to act as human shields in Gaza, sending them into buildings and tunnels to check for bombs and fighters, the report said. Israel’s military said it strictly prohibits using civilians as shields.
Seven Palestinians killed in Israeli bombing on al-Mawasi
Our colleagues on the ground are reporting that an Israeli air raid on al-Mawasi in Rafah has killed seven people.
We will bring you more on this as soon as we can.
‘Displacement, starvation, thirst’ plague Palestinians across Gaza
Amjad Shawa, head of the Palestinian NGO Network, says there has been “no major change” in the situation in Gaza after limited aid entered the enclave over the past days.
He told Al Jazeera in an interview from Gaza City that flour, baby formula and some medical materials have reached southern Gaza, but nothing has reached northern Gaza.
“People are starving all over the Gaza Strip. The conditions – the displacement, the starvation, the thirst – is there, all over Gaza,” Shawa said.
He added that there is no water for drinking or daily use in central Gaza’s Deir el-Balah area, while hospitals across the territory lack necessary supplies.
“Most of the hospitals are out of service,” he said.
US-led aid distribution in Gaza postponed to Monday or Tuesday
Originally set to begin on Sunday, the delay is due to logistical reasons, Israeli outlet Ynet reported.
Three aid distribution points have been established in the enclave: In Rafah, between the Morag and Philadelphi axes, and on the Saladin axis, the outlet said.
The aid will be distributed to Palestinians through family representatives, Ynet reported.
Health workers, others trapped inside Gaza hospital: Health Ministry
Several healthcare workers and others at the European Hospital in Khan Younis could not be evacuated because of repeated Israeli fire, Gaza’s Health Ministry says.
In a statement shared on Telegram, the ministry called on “the relevant authorities to provide protection for healthcare facilities” and their staff.
At least 94 percent of Gaza’s hospitals have been damaged or destroyed in Israel’s war on the enclave, the World Health Organization said on Friday.
Hamas slams Israeli attack that killed nine children in Khan Younis
The Palestinian group calls the air strike on the home of Dr Alaa al-Najjar, a doctor at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, “a horrific massacre”.
“This heinous crime clearly expresses the sadistic nature of the occupation, and the level of the deep-rooted spirit of revenge that drives Netanyahu and his gang of murderers and human monsters,” Hamas said in a statement.
It also stressed that Israel has been “deliberately targeting the medical personnel, civilians and their families in an attempt to break their will” since the start of the war.
Israel’s attack on Friday killed nine of their 10 children.
Palestinians fear displacement as Israel builds national park
Israel calls it an archaeological project to highlight Jewish heritage and create a new Israeli national park.
Palestinians see it as further evidence of Israel’s plans to annex an ancient town and erase Palestinian history in an area that tells the 5,000-year-old shared story of the peoples who have lived in this land.
Far-right, pro-settler Israeli government ministers were in Sebastia on May 12 as part of a delegation to mark the looming seizure of the town’s archaeological park, one of the largest and most important of 6,000 sites in the West Bank.
Read more here.
Palestinian killed by Israeli army near Hebron checkpoint
The Israeli army says it has killed a Palestinian who it claimed was trying to stab soldiers at a military checkpoint near Hebron in the southern occupied West Bank.
In a statement, the Israeli army claimed that its forces responded to a reported stabbing attempt at a Hebron-area checkpoint and “neutralised” the assailant. No injuries to soldiers were reported.
In numbers: Palestinians targeted across occupied West Bank
At least 981 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces and settlers across the occupied West Bank since October 7, 2023.
The figure includes 199 children.
In addition, more than 8,785 Palestinians have been wounded in these attacks.
Israeli settlers attack water supply of West Bank communities
Israeli settlers damaged water pipes supplying Palestinian families in the al-Auja waterfall area, located north of Jericho in the occupied West Bank, according to a local rights organisation.
Hassan Mleihat, general supervisor of the Al-Baidar Organization for the Defense of Bedouin Rights, told Wafa news agency that settlers tampered with the water supply to force Palestinian residents into leaving their land.
Israeli killing of Palestinians in occupied West Bank spirals
While the world’s attention is focused on the spiralling death toll in Gaza – where more than 53,822 people have been killed in Israeli attacks since October 7, 2023, the number of Palestinians killed in the occupied West Bank continues to mount, according to the UN.
The death toll in the occupied West Bank now stands at 938 Palestinians killed since Israel began its war on Gaza. At least 198 children were counted among that figure of those killed by Israeli forces or settlers, the UN said.
The UN also notes that 132 Palestinians – including at least 25 children – have been killed since the start of this year.
Alongside the killings of Palestinians in the West Bank, approximately 42,000 residents of the occupied territory’s Nur Shams, Tulkarem and Jenin refugee camps remain displaced after Israeli forces mounted a major military operation against Palestinian communities there in January.