49 Killed by Israeli Strikes in Gaza over 24 Hours, as Mediators Scramble to Restart Ceasefire

Palestinians inspect the damage at Al Farabi school following an Israeli airstrike, in Gaza City, northern Gaza Strip, 25 April 2025. (EPA)
Palestinians inspect the damage at Al Farabi school following an Israeli airstrike, in Gaza City, northern Gaza Strip, 25 April 2025. (EPA)
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49 Killed by Israeli Strikes in Gaza over 24 Hours, as Mediators Scramble to Restart Ceasefire

Palestinians inspect the damage at Al Farabi school following an Israeli airstrike, in Gaza City, northern Gaza Strip, 25 April 2025. (EPA)
Palestinians inspect the damage at Al Farabi school following an Israeli airstrike, in Gaza City, northern Gaza Strip, 25 April 2025. (EPA)

 

At least 49 people were killed by Israeli strikes in the last 24 hours, according to health officials, as Arab mediators scrambled to restart a ceasefire.
An airstrike in a neighborhood in western Gaza City early Saturday morning, flattened a three-story house, killing 10 people, according to a cameraman cooperating with The Associated Press. The number was confirmed by Gaza’s Health Ministry, along with three more people who were killed in the Shati refugee camp along the city's shoreline.
There was no immediate comment from Israel on the strikes.
The attacks come as Hamas said on Saturday that it sent a high-level delegation to Cairo to try and get the stalled ceasefire back on track.
Israel ended a ceasefire with Hamas last month and has vowed to continue the war until all the hostages are returned and Hamas is destroyed, or disarmed and sent into exile. It says it will hold parts of Gaza indefinitely and implement President Donald Trump’s proposal for the resettlement of the population in other countries, which has been widely rejected internationally.
Hamas has said it will only release the dozens of hostages it holds in return for Palestinian prisoners, a complete Israeli withdrawal and a lasting ceasefire, as called for in the now-defunct agreement reached in January.
Hamas said Saturday that the delegation will discuss with Egyptian officials the group's vision to end the war, which includes the complete withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza and reconstruction.
Earlier this week, other Hamas officials arrived in Cairo to discuss a proposal that would include a five-to-seven year truce and the release of all remaining hostages, officials said.
Egypt and Qatar are still developing the proposal, which would include the gradual withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza and the release of Palestinian prisoners, according to an Egyptian official and a Hamas official who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the media.
Meanwhile, Israel has continued its nearly two-month blockade on Gaza even as aid groups warn that supplies are dwindling.
On Friday, the World Food Program said its food stocks in Gaza had run out, ending a main source of sustenance for hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in the territory. The WFP said in a statement that it delivered the last of its stocks to charity kitchens that it supports around Gaza. It said those kitchens are expected to run out of food in the coming days.
About 80% of Gaza’s population of more than 2 million relies primarily on charity kitchens for food, because other sources have shut down under Israel’s blockade, according to the UN The WFP has been supporting 47 kitchens that distribute 644,000 hot meals a day, WFP spokesperson Abeer Etefa told The Associated Press.
Israel’s offensive has killed over 51,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, according to the Health Ministry, which does not say how many of the dead were fighters or civilians. Israel says it has killed around 20,000 of the Hamas group, without providing evidence.
The war began when the Hamas-led group stormed into southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting 251. The militants still have 59 hostages, 24 of whom are believed to be alive, after most of the rest were released in ceasefire agreements or other deals.

 
 



Israeli Strikes Across Gaza Kill at Least 66 People, Hospitals and Medics Say

A picture taken from a position at the Israeli border with the Gaza Strip shows smoke billowing due to Israeli bombardment in the besieged Palestinian territory on May 18, 2025. (AFP)
A picture taken from a position at the Israeli border with the Gaza Strip shows smoke billowing due to Israeli bombardment in the besieged Palestinian territory on May 18, 2025. (AFP)
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Israeli Strikes Across Gaza Kill at Least 66 People, Hospitals and Medics Say

A picture taken from a position at the Israeli border with the Gaza Strip shows smoke billowing due to Israeli bombardment in the besieged Palestinian territory on May 18, 2025. (AFP)
A picture taken from a position at the Israeli border with the Gaza Strip shows smoke billowing due to Israeli bombardment in the besieged Palestinian territory on May 18, 2025. (AFP)

Israeli strikes across the Gaza Strip killed at least 66 people overnight and into Sunday, hospitals and medics in the battered enclave said as Israel launches an escalation of its war in the territory, which it says is meant to ramp up pressure on Hamas to agree to a temporary ceasefire.

The Israeli military had no immediate comment.

The Nasser hospital in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis said it received the bodies of 20 people who were killed in multiple overnight airstrikes that hit houses and tents sheltering displaced families in the Muwasi area.

In northern Gaza, at least 36 people were killed in multiple strikes, according to first responders from the health ministry and the civil defense.

The dead included nine people from a single family who were killed when an airstrike hit their house in the built-up Jabaliya refugee camp, according to the health ministry’s emergency services.

Another strike hit the house of the Berawi family, also in Jabaliya, killing 10 people including seven children and a woman, according to the civil defense, which operates under the Hamas-run government. Among the dead were two parents and their three children and a father and his four children, it said.

In central Gaza, at least 10 people were killed in two separate strikes, according to the Al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital in the town of Deir al-Balah. One strike in the Zweida town killed seven people, including two children and four women. The second hit an apartment in Deir al-Balah, killing two parents and their child, the hospital said.