The United States stated that it would not share any Israeli intelligence or specify its own intelligence assessment of Hamas using the Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza as a command centre.
Hamas could also reportedly use the hospital as a storage facility, even though Israeli soldiers claimed to have found a tunnel shaft used by the militants.
The UN expressed concern that humanitarian aid through the Rafah crossing with Egypt would not be delivered to the Palestinians on Friday. At the same time, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated that Israel was doing everything possible to keep civilians out of danger, including distributing leaflets warning them to flee, but its attempts to minimise casualties were “not successful.
On Thursday, internet and telephone services shut down due to a fuel shortage in the Gaza Strip. The cut-off of communications has virtually isolated Gaza’s 2.3 million residents from the rest of the world, exacerbating an already dire humanitarian crisis in the region.
The UN World Food Programme warns of an imminent risk of starvation in the Gaza Strip as the food supply chain has been severely disrupted by the Israeli siege, with insufficient food coming from Egypt.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken held a conversation on Thursday with Benny Gantz, a member of the Israeli war cabinet. They discussed expanding and hastening the delivery of vital humanitarian aid to the enclave, as well as strategies to prevent an escalation of the conflict and facilitate the release of hostages.
The Israeli military reported the discovery of the body of Yehudit Weiss, a 65-year-old hostage taken by Hamas in a building near Al-Shifa Hospital. The cause of her death was not specified.
