The Gaza Civil Defence Agency said Israeli strikes overnight Monday killed at least 19 people in the Palestinian territory, where Israel has renewed its offensive against Hamas.
Gaza rescuers say 19 killed in Israeli strikes overnight
A civil defence spokesman said the dead included several children and dozens wounded in the latest Israeli shelling.
Five children and four adults were killed in a strike on a house in the central city of Deir al-Balah, while two separate pre-dawn attacks on Gaza City and Beit Lahia in the north killed a total of ten people, the spokesman said.
In addition, media affiliated with Islamic Jihad, a Hamas ally, announced the death of a staff member named Ahmed Mansour in an Israeli strike on a tent used by journalists in the Khan Younis neighbourhood.
Israel resumed heavy strikes on Gaza on March 18, ending a two-month truce with Hamas. Attempts to restore the truce have so far failed.
According to the Ministry of Health, at least 1,391 Palestinians have died in the Hamas-ruled territory as a result of renewed Israeli operations, bringing the total number of deaths since the beginning of the war to 50,752. A Hamas attack on Israel in October 2023, which started the war, killed 1,218 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.
Trump calls Gaza “incredibly important piece of real estate”
US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu discussed Gaza, Syria, Iran and tariffs in a nearly two-hour meeting.
Trump reiterated the idea of taking control of the Gaza Strip, saying it could become a “zone of freedom,” NBC News reports.
“I think it’s an incredible piece of important real estate. And I think it’s something that we would be involved in, but, you know, having a peace force like the United States there, controlling and owning the Gaza Strip, would be a good thing,” he said.
Mass protest in Morocco condemns Israel’s Gaza operation
Tens of thousands of Moroccans turned out for a rally in Rabat on Sunday to protest Israel’s war on Gaza. Protesters took to the streets to express their solidarity with the people of Palestine and outrage over US support for the war. Massive crowds of demonstrators waved Palestinian flags, chanting “Free Gaza.”
The demonstration in Morocco is one of many pro-Palestinian rallies over the past week. Similar protests have taken place across the region, including in Tunisia and Yemen.
More outrage was sparked by Morocco’s decision to normalise relations with Israel. In 2020, Morocco, the US and Israel signed the Abraham Accords, which established diplomatic, political and economic ties between the countries. Despite this agreement, public sentiment towards Israel remains largely negative. Abdelhak El Arabi, an adviser to Morocco’s former prime minister, predicts public hostility will increase until the fighting in Gaza stops.
The organisers also express their outrage at the US for the Trump administration’s role in the Gaza war. They condemn Trump’s proposed redevelopment of Gaza, which would displace millions of Palestinians. Additional concerns are the US government’s harassment and detention of pro-Palestinian student activists.
Britons accused of killing civilians in Gaza
A group of British lawyers from The Hague will today lodge a complaint with the Metropolitan Police in London against 10 British citizens who served in the IDF and fought in the Gaza Strip, on suspicion of committing war crimes.
The lawyers have prepared a 240-page report in which they allege “targeted killings of civilians and aid workers.” The report also alleges the use of sniper fire and indiscriminate attacks on civilian targets, including hospitals.
The report is submitted on behalf of the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR), based in the Gaza Strip, and the Public Interest Law Centre (PILC), which is based in the UK. It describes alleged crimes committed in the Gaza Strip between October 2023 and May 2024. The report took six months to produce. British nationals are accused of “coordinated attacks on protected sites, including historical and religious properties” and “forcibly displacing and deporting civilians.”
The names of the suspects have not yet been made public. Michael Mansfield, a senior British lawyer who was part of the team that wrote the report, said stressed that if a British national was committing an offence, “we ought to be doing something about it.” He also added:
“British nationals are under a legal obligation not to collude with crimes committed in Palestine. No one is above the law.”
The lawyers who prepared the report said the document was based on open-source evidence and eyewitness accounts which together form a “compelling” evidence base: “The public will be shocked to receive evidence that the British were directly involved in some of the atrocities described in the report. We will ensure that these soldiers are brought to trial at the London Criminal Court for serious offences.”
