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Here’s where things stand on Thursday 31 July 2025:
- Israel’s relentless bombardment of the besieged Gaza Strip continues, with at least 34 Palestinians killed since dawn on Thursday, including 15 aid seekers.
- Source at Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis says a young man from Rafah has died from starvation. Earlier, medics said the total hunger-related death toll since the start of the war stood at 154, including 89 children.
- Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney says his country will recognise a Palestinian state at the United Nations General Assembly in September, citing the need for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
- Israel’s war on Gaza has killed at least 60,239 people and wounded 146,894 others. An estimated 1,139 people were killed in Israel during the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, attack, and more than 200 were taken captive.
Captives’ families welcome Arab nations’ call for Hamas to disarm
The families of captives held in Gaza have welcomed a declaration from a group of Arab nations calling, for the first time, for Hamas to disarm and relinquish power in Gaza.
“We welcome this important progress and the Arab League’s recognition that Hamas must end its rule in Gaza. Kidnapping innocent men, women, and children is a blatant violation of international law and must be unequivocally condemned,” read a statement from the group.
On Tuesday, a number of countries, including Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Egypt, backed a seven-page text agreed at a UN conference on reviving a two-state solution for Israel and the Palestinians.
“In the context of ending the war in Gaza, Hamas must end its rule in Gaza and hand over its weapons to the Palestinian Authority, with international engagement and support, in line with the objective of a sovereign and independent Palestinian State,” read the statement cited by the AFP news agency.
It followed a call on Monday by the Palestinian delegation at the United Nations for both Israel and Hamas to leave Gaza, allowing the Palestinian Authority to administer the coastal territory.
Hamas has said it was ready to hand over the governing of Gaza to “an independent technocratic committee”. But the Palestinian group has repeatedly said that disarming was a red line.
Gaza death toll rises
At least 101 Palestinians, including 81 aid seekers, have been killed and 625 injured in Israeli attacks across Gaza in the past 24 hours, according to the enclave’s Health Ministry.
Israel’s war on Gaza has killed a total of 60,239 Palestinians and injured 146,894 others since October 7, 2023, the ministry said on Telegram.
The total number of aid seekers killed since May 27 when Israel introduced a new aid distribution mechanism has reached 1,320, with more than 8,818 injured, the statement said.
‘If the baby could speak, she would scream at us, asking what we are putting into her stomach’
In a makeshift tent on a Gaza beach, three-month-old Muntaha’s grandmother Nemah Hamouda grinds up chickpeas into the tiniest granules she can to form a paste to feed the baby, knowing it will cause her to cry in pain as she tries to keep her from starving.
“I am terrified about the fate of the baby,” Hamouda told the Reuters news agency. “We named her after her mother, … hoping she can survive and live long, but we are so afraid. We hear children and adults die every day of hunger.”
Muntaha grimaced and squirmed as her grandmother fed her the paste with a syringe.
“If the baby could speak, she would scream at us, asking what we are putting into her stomach,” her aunt Abir Hamouda told Reuters.
Muntaha now weighs about 3.5kg (7.7lb), her family said, barely more than half of what a full-term baby her age would normally weigh. She suffers from digestive problems, which can lead to vomiting and diarrhoea after feeding.
False Israeli accusations against Al Jazeera journalist put his life in danger: UN official
Irene Khan, UN special rapporteur on freedom of expression, says her organisation was “deeply concerned” by the Israeli army’s threats against Anas al-Sharif, the last Al Jazeera journalist in the northern Gaza Strip.
She spoke to our colleagues at Al Jazeera Arabic and made the following points:
- The Israeli army accuses al-Sharif and other journalists, without any evidence, of being “terrorists”.
- We call on the world to prevent Israel from targeting al-Sharif and other journalists in Gaza.
- The Israeli army is falsely labelling journalists as “terrorists” to justify their killing.
- Israel refuses to allow any international journalist into Gaza and smears the reputation of local journalists.
- The killing and detention of Palestinian journalists is an Israeli strategy to suppress the truth.
- We call for the protection of brave journalists in Gaza, as their reports of genocide can move the world.
Witkoff arrives in Israel: Reports
The Times of Israel newspaper, citing Hebrew-language media outlets, says US special envoy Steve Witkoff has landed in Israel for meetings on Gaza.
It said Israeli news site Ynet had reported that Witkoff is also expected to visit Gaza during his trip, and will visit aid distribution sites run by the Israeli- and US-backed GHF.
On Wednesday, US officials said Witkoff would meet with Israeli officials “to discuss next steps in addressing the situation in Gaza”.
Gaza death toll since dawn rises to 34
At least 15 aid seekers were among 34 Palestinians killed by Israeli forces across Gaza since dawn.
That’s according to medical sources speaking to Al Jazeera Arabic.
Europe’s silence on Gaza is complicity: Ex-envoys warn
To the Presidents of the European Council, the European Commission, and the European Parliament, and the High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy of the European Union,
To the Heads of Government and Foreign Ministers of the EU Member States,
We, 58 former ambassadors of the European Union, were appalled and outraged by the slaughter of innocent Israelis and hostage taking on October 7, 2023 by Hamas and others. No cause can justify such acts, and we condemn them outright.
Today, however, we are witnessing the horrifying spectacle of Israel carrying out, on a daily basis, atrocity crimes against the Palestinian people – above all in Gaza, but also in the occupied West Bank, amounting to a systematic campaign of brutalisation, dehumanisation, and displacement.
Photos: Palestinians forced to sift through rubbish in search of food
Young man starves to death in southern Gaza’s Rafah: Hospital
A source at Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis has told our colleagues at Al Jazeera Arabic that a young man from Rafah has died from starvation.
On Wednesday, Gaza’s Health Ministry reported 154 hunger-related deaths since October 7, 2023, saying 89 children were among those who starved to death.
‘I haven’t had any flour for nearly two months’: Khan Younis resident
Al Jazeera’s Ibrahim al-Khalili has spoken to Palestinians in Gaza who are struggling to find any food to feed their family after Israel’s months-long blockade. This has forced some people to loot the limited number of aid trucks entering Gaza before they reach warehouses.
Imad al-Attar, living in Khan Younis, who had looted a bag of flour from an aid truck so that he could feed his children, told Al Jazeera that his family hasn’t had “any flour for nearly two months”.
“We just want to eat and survive,” al-Attar said as he carried a bag of flour over his shoulders.
Ashraf Azzam, who is living in Gaza City, said “even the amounts of aid entering now are not enough for the starving Palestinian population, which urgently needs larger quantities”.
“In the past, we used to receive respectful notifications inviting us to collect aid packages from warehouses in an organised manner;” he said.
“Now, with very few trucks coming in, desperate and starving people – who have been starved by the occupation – are forced to rush the trucks and seize the aid; as a result, ordinary people, the elderly and people with disabilities can’t get this aid,” Azzam added.
No news on Gaza doctor, official 10 days after ‘enforced disappearance’: Ministry
The Gaza Health Ministry says 10 days have passed since the Israeli “kidnapping” of Marwan al-Hams, a doctor and the director of field hospitals in the enclave.
According to the ministry, there is no information about his health status and conditions of detention.
Palestinian authorities say al-Hams was taken by an Israeli undercover unit last week outside the field hospital of the International Committee of the Red Cross in the southern city of Rafah.
Israel “is practicing enforced disappearance against imprisoned medical personnel”, the ministry said in a statement. At least 361 medical personnel remain imprisoned in Israeli jails, it added.
Aid truck drivers in Gaza ‘have no protection at all’
Al Jazeera’s Ibrahim al-Khalili visited a UN warehouse in northern Gaza, where, four days after Israel agreed to allow a limited number of humanitarian aid trucks to cross the border, nothing has arrived.
He spoke to Jihad Shuheiber, a truck driver who was shot when a gang attacked the aid truck he was driving
“The UN cars come in with us – we load the aid together, then they let us out in small groups, 10 vehicles at a time, but as soon as we exit, people swarm us; they climb onto the trucks, damage the vehicles,” Shuheiber said.
“Drivers have no protection at all. Sometimes, you’ll see 1,000 people surrounding one truck – you can’t even see the front of the vehicle. It’s heartbreaking,” Shuheiber said.
A US government analysis has found no evidence Hamas has systematically stolen aid – despite Israeli claims. But armed gangs have filled the power vacuum left by nearly two years of Israeli bombardment.
People forced to climb, fight on top of aid trucks in Gaza in desperation
There is a very high level of hunger and desperation in Gaza. What we are witnessing on a daily basis is heartbreaking.
As soon as aid trucks appear, when the small number of them are allowed by the Israeli military to enter, a crowd of desperate people swarm to them, climb on them, trying to grab even a small portion of food.
They are sometimes even fighting between each other, because if they don’t grab food, they and their children are not going to eat for that day.
There is no organised distribution in the majority of the areas. There is also no protection for those who receive or deliver aid.
We see children fainting while seeking aid because of the heat, and families walking long distances with no guarantee they are going to get food or water.
It shows the total collapse of humanitarian access for these people. It shows also the consequences of enforced starvation and dehydration.
Israeli army claims to have completed activities in northern Gaza
The Israeli army says its 98th Division ended its activities in the northern Gaza Strip and is now preparing for additional tasks.
As part of its operation in the north, Israeli troops operated in Gaza City’s Shujayea and Zeitoun neighbourhoods above and below the ground, it said.
The military claimed to have destroyed more than 1,500 “terrorist infrastructures” and killed dozens of armed groups’ fighters.
Baby suffers from tear gas inhalation in Israeli raid near Hebron: Report
A six-month-old baby has suffered from tear gas inhalation during an Israeli military raid in a village southwest of Hebron in the occupied West Bank, according to the Wafa news agency.
During the military incursion, eight people were arrested, the report said.
According to Wafa, raids also took place in Beit Ummar, north of Hebron, where several homes were raided and four men were detained, and in the village of Umm al-Khair in the Masafer Yatta area, where homes were searched, ransacked, and three men were arrested.
US nurse invites Witkoff to visit Gaza hospital
An American nurse volunteering at southern Gaza’s Nasser Hospital urges US special envoy Steve Witkoff to visit the enclave and witness firsthand the effect Israel’s aid blockade is having on the Palestinian population.
“If Mr Witkoff is gonna come to Israel, then I would invite him to come inside to Gaza, come inside and take a look for yourself – don’t believe what other people are saying. Take a look with your own eyes. I would be happy to take you through the halls here and show you the type of patients we are treating,” Elidalias Burgos said in a video published by the Gaza Health Ministry and social media users.
“Once you see it, you can’t unsee it and if you have a heart, if you are a human being with a heart, you will be heartbroken,” Burgos said.
Gaza death toll since dawn rises to 27
Medical sources have told our colleagues on the ground that at least 27 people were killed by Israeli forces in the Gaza Strip since dawn.
The sources said 10 aid seekers were among those killed.
West Bank’s Silwad residents to go on strike to protest killing of two Palestinians
We reported earlier that the Israeli military shot two Palestinians dead in the occupied West Bank town of Silwad, east of Ramallah.
Residents in the town are now organising a comprehensive strike to mourn the men, one of whom has been identified by the Quds News Network as Khamis Ayyad.
The second deceased person is yet to be identified. We will bring you further updates when we have them.
Armed wing of Hamas shells Israeli soldiers in southern Gaza
Hamas says its armed wing, Qassam Brigades, has attacked a group of Israeli soldiers and vehicles with a number of mortar shells east of al-Qarara town near southern Gaza’s Khan Younis city.
The group did not elaborate on the results of the attack.
Hamas marks first anniversary of Haniyeh’s killing
The Palestinian group says “a treacherous and cowardly Zionist crime” that saw Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh killed in the Iranian capital of Tehran on July 31 last year “has only increased” the resistance of the Palestinian people against the Israeli occupation.
“It is a matter of loyalty to the martyr leader Ismail Haniyeh that we continue to affirm his call to our people, our nation, and free people around the world, to make the third of August of each year a global national day to support Gaza, Jerusalem, Al-Aqsa, and the prisoners, and to continue the movement until the war of extermination and starvation against our people in the Gaza Strip stops, until the occupation is expelled from all our land, and until our people achieve their freedom,” the long statement published on Telegram said.
Trump says ‘very hard’ to agree trade deal if Canada to recognise Palestinian state
Previously, we reported that Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said his country intends to recognise a Palestinian state at the UN General Assembly in September.
President Trump has now thrown doubt over ongoing tariff negotiations with Canada, writing on his Truth Social platform that Ottawa’s plan to recognise a Palestinian state “will make it very hard for us to make a Trade Deal with them”.
The Trump administration has said it will impose a 35 percent tariff on many Canadian goods from Friday if a trade deal is not reached.
