US says Gaza civilian toll 'unacceptably high' as Israeli strikes continue
WASHINGTON
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken told two top Israeli officials Monday of the "unacceptably high" civilian casualties in Israel's bombardment of the besieged Gaza Strip, his spokesman said.
The Israeli military has launched several deadly attacks in recent days including on a refugee camp and multiple U.N.-run schools where civilians were sheltering.
In response, Hamas said it was pulling out of ceasefire negotiations, causing prospects for a truce and hostage release deal to dwindle further.
Blinken received two influential Israeli officials -- Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer and National Security Advisor Tzachi Hanegbi -- "to express our serious concern about the recent civilian casualties in Gaza."
Casualties "still remain unacceptably high. We continue to see far too many civilians killed in this conflict," State Department spokesman Matthew Miller told reporters.
On Saturday, Israeli strikes killed more than 90 people in the Al-Mawasi camp near Khan Yunis, the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said.
AFP reported sirens wailing and women screaming as children were pulled bloody and unmoving from the wreckage in Al-Mawasi, which Israel had declared a "safe zone".
The Israeli military said the bombardment targeted two people -- the head of Hamas's military wing, Mohammed Deif, and his close associate Rafa Salama who the army said was killed.
A Hamas official said Sunday that Deif was "well and directly overseeing" operations, though doubts remained.
The two Israeli officials told Blinken that "they do not have certainty yet" about Deif's fate, according to Miller.
The bilateral discussions also focused on a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, humanitarian aid for Gaza and post-war plans, he said.
The visit comes several few days before Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is expected to address the U.S. Congress on July 24.
"We continue to hear from Israel directly that they want to reach a ceasefire and that they're committed to the proposal that they put forward," Miller said.
The United States has strongly defended Israel since the October 7 attacks by Hamas, in which 1,195 people, mostly civilians, were killed, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli figures.
During the attack, the militants also seized 251 hostages, 116 of whom are still in Gaza including 42 the military says are dead.
Israel's military offensive has killed at least 38,584 people, also mostly civilians, according to data provided by the Gaza health ministry.
U.S. President Joe Biden has been under mounting political pressure over the plight of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
"We are incredibly troubled by the ongoing deaths of Palestinians in Gaza," Miller said Monday, when asked about U.S. weapons provided to Israel.
Israel air, artillery strikes hit Gaza
Israeli air and artillery fire pounded the Gaza Strip on Monday, more than nine months into the war between Israel and Palestinian Hamas militants as peace hopes faded.
Fallout from the fighting again spread to the surrounding region. Two ships were attacked off Yemen, according to security agencies, while a war monitor said an Israeli strike near the Syria-Lebanon border killed a Western-sanctioned businessman who was close to Syria's president.
Hamas's armed wing said militants had fired a missile at two Israeli tanks in the Tal al-Hawa district of Gaza City, in the north.
Artillery fire rained down on Tal al-Hawa and other neighbourhoods of the city, AFP correspondents reported, and in central Gaza, eyewitnesses said the Israeli army had shelled areas including the outskirts of Nuseirat refugee camp.
A hospital source reported three dead from a strike on a house in Deir al-Balah city, also in the centre of the coastal territory, after paramedics from the Palestine Red Crescent said they had retrieved the bodies of five people following Israeli air strikes in the nearby Al-Maghazi camp.
In southern Gaza, witnesses reported artillery fire and helicopter strikes east of Khan Yunis city and western areas of Rafah, near the Egyptian border.
Raids
The Israeli military said it was continuing its activity throughout the territory and had conducted raids in Rafah and central Gaza that killed "a number of" militants, as well as air strikes throughout the strip over the past day.
The war began with Hamas's unprecedented October 7 attack on southern Israel which resulted in the deaths of 1,195 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli figures.
The militants also seized 251 hostages, 116 of whom are still in Gaza including 42 the Israeli military says are dead.
Israel responded with a military offensive that has killed at least 38,664 people, also mostly civilians, according to data provided by the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza.
The latest toll on Monday includes 80 new deaths in 24 hours, the ministry said.
A senior Hamas official told AFP on Sunday, citing the movement's political chief Ismail Haniyeh, that the group was suspending participation in indirect talks towards a ceasefire partly because of Israeli "massacres against unarmed civilians".
Hamas was "ready" to return to talks when Israel "demonstrates seriousness" in reaching a deal, the official said.
The comment came after Gaza's health ministry said at least 92 people had been killed and 300 wounded in a strike on Al-Mawasi, an Israeli-designated "safe zone" on the coast.
The Israeli strike targeted the head of Hamas's military wing, Mohammed Deif, and killed a militant Israel's military called one of Deif's closest associates.
Mass displacement
Last week, US President Joe Biden had suggested a truce deal might be close, saying at a NATO summit that both sides had agreed to a framework he had set out in late May.
Hamas on Monday lashed out at the United States, accusing it of supporting "genocide" through its weapons supplies to Israel.
The United States provides Israel with billions of dollars in military aid annually.
"We condemn in the strongest terms the American disdain for the blood of the children and women of our Palestinian people", a statement from the Hamas government media office said.
Talks have been mediated by Qatar and Egypt, with US support, but months of negotiations have failed to bring a breakthrough.
Critics in Israel, including demonstrators who have marched at times by the tens of thousands to demand a hostage-release deal, have accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of prolonging the war.
Netanyahu has vowed to destroy Hamas and bring back all hostages from Gaza.
The war has displaced virtually the entire population of the territory, many of whom have sought shelter in schools, six of which have been hit in strikes since July 6.
Death on the border
Gaza's civil defence agency said on Monday that an Israeli strike on a school in Gaza City killed at least one person. Gaza's health ministry said the toll from a strike Sunday on a U.N.-run school in Nuseirat had risen to 22.
Israel says Hamas uses schools, hospitals and other public infrastructure for military purposes. The militants deny this.
The war has led to near-daily exchanges of fire between Israeli forces and Lebanon's Iran-backed Hezbollah movement, which says it is acting in support of Hamas.
An Israeli strike on a vehicle near the Syria-Lebanon border on Monday killed two people including Baraa Katerji, who was close to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, said the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
It said Katerji, a businessman who had been sanctioned by the United States, funded a group linked to Hezbollah.
In another incident, a Hezbollah fighter and his sister were killed during an Israeli strike on Bint Jbeil, southern Lebanon, according to the official National News Agency of Lebanon, and Hezbollah. Israel said an air strike hit a Hezbollah arms stockpile in the area.
Off Yemen, where another Iran-backed group has attacked commercial vessels also in professed support of the Palestinians, two ships were attacked on Monday, British security agencies said.
Yemen's Huthi rebels later said they had targeted two tankers in the Red Sea.
Both vessels continued their journeys, one with "some damage," the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations agency said.