Israeli strikes kill scores in Gaza as Egypt offers new ceasefire proposal

Jerusalem: Israeli strikes across the Gaza Strip have killed more than 60 Palestinians, including women and children, the Gaza Health Ministry said on Monday, nearly a week after Israel ended its ceasefire with Hamas with a surprise bombardment.

Meanwhile, officials say Egypt has introduced a new proposal to try and get the Israel-Hamas ceasefire back on track.

Hamas would release five living hostages, including an American-Israeli, in return for Israel allowing humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip and a weeks-long pause in the fighting, an Egyptian official said on Monday. Israel would also release hundreds of Palestinian prisoners.

A Hamas official said the group had “responded positively” to the proposal, without elaborating. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to brief media on the closed-door talks.

The Gaza Health Ministry said on Monday the bodies of 61 people killed by Israeli strikes have been brought to hospitals over the past 24 hours. Hospitals also received 143 wounded, it said in its daily report.

The overall Palestinian death toll from the Israel-Hamas war rose to at least 50,082, the ministry said. Another 113,408 have been wounded, it said. Its figures do not distinguish between civilians and combatants.

Separately, Palestinian medics said that an Israeli strike hit a school where displaced people were sheltering in the Gaza Strip, killing at least four people, including a child.

Another 18 people were wounded in Monday’s strike in the built-up Nuseirat refugee camp, according to Al-Awda Hospital, which received the casualties.

There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military, which says it only targets militants and tries to avoid harming civilians. Israel blames civilian deaths on Hamas because it operates in densely populated areas.

Meanwhile, thousands of people are trapped in the city of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip after Israeli forces encircled part of it on Sunday, Palestinian officials said.

Israel ordered the evacuation of the Tel al-Sultan neighbourhood, telling people to leave by a single route on foot to Muwasi, a sprawling cluster of tent camps along the coast.

The Rafah municipality said Monday that thousands were still trapped, including first responders from the Civil Defence, which operates under the Hamas-run government, and the Palestinian Red

Crescent. WITH AGENCIES INPUTS