Israel steps up Gaza bombardment ahead of White House talks on ceasefire

Palestinians in northern Gaza reported one of the worst nights of Israeli bombardment in weeks after the military issued mass evacuation orders on Monday, while Israeli officials were due in Washington for a new ceasefire push by the Trump administration.

A day after US President Donald Trump urged an end to the 20-month-old conflict, a confidant of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was expected at the White House for talks on a Gaza ceasefire, Iran, and possible wider regional diplomatic deals.

But on the ground in the Palestinian enclave, there was no sign of fighting letting up.

“Explosions never stopped; they bombed schools and homes. It felt like earthquakes,” said Salah, 60, a father of five children, from Gaza City. “In the news, we hear a ceasefire is near, on the ground, we see death, and we hear explosions.”

Israeli tanks pushed into the eastern areas of the Zeitoun suburb in Gaza City and shelled several areas in the north, while aircraft bombed at least four schools after ordering hundreds of families sheltering inside to leave, residents said.

At least 25 people were killed in Israeli strikes on Monday, health authorities said, including 10 people killed in Zeitoun.

The Israeli military said it struck militant targets in northern Gaza, including command and control centres, after taking steps to mitigate the risk of harming civilians.

The heavy bombardment followed new evacuation orders to vast areas in the north, where Israeli forces had operated before and left behind wide-scale destruction.

The military ordered people there to head south, saying that it planned to fight Hamas fighters operating in northern Gaza, including in the heart of Gaza City.

Later on Monday, health officials at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis said at least 13 people had been killed southwest of Gaza City, bringing Monday’s death toll to at least 38.

Medics said most of the casualties were hit by gunfire, but residents also reported an airstrike. There was no immediate comment by the Israeli military on the incident.

Next steps

A day after Trump called to “Make the deal in Gaza, get the hostages back”, Israel’s strategic affairs minister, Ron Dermer, a confidant of Netanyahu’s, was expected on Monday at the White House for talks on Iran and Gaza, an Israeli official said.

In Israel, Netanyahu’s security cabinet was expected to convene to discuss the next steps in Gaza.

On Friday, Israel’s military chief said the present ground operation was close to having achieved its goals, and on Sunday, Netanyahu said new opportunities had opened up for recovering the hostages, 20 of whom are believed to still be alive.

Palestinian and Egyptian sources with knowledge of the latest ceasefire efforts said that mediators Qatar and Egypt have stepped up their contacts with the two warring sides, but that no date has been set yet for a new round of truce talks.

A Hamas official said that progress depends on Israel changing its position and agreeing to end the conflict and withdraw from Gaza. Israel says it can end the offensive only when Hamas is disarmed and dismantled. Hamas refuses to lay down its arms.

Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said that Israel has agreed to a US-proposed 60-day ceasefire and hostage deal, and put the onus on Hamas.

“Israel is serious in its will to reach a hostage deal and ceasefire in Gaza,” Saar told reporters in Jerusalem.

The US has proposed a 60-day ceasefire and the release of half the hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners and the remains of other Palestinians. Hamas would release the remaining hostages as part of a deal that guarantees the end of the conflict.

The conflict began when Hamas fighters stormed into Israel on October 7, 2023, killed 1,200 people, most of them civilians, and took 251 hostages back to Gaza in a surprise attack that led to Israel’s single deadliest day.

Israel’s subsequent military assault has killed more than 56,000 Palestinians, most of them civilians, has displaced almost the whole 2.3 million population and plunged the enclave into a humanitarian crisis.

More than 80 per cent of the territory is now an Israeli-militarised zone or under displacement orders, according to the United Nations.

Pressure mounts on Netanyahu to end Gaza campaign

Netanyahu’s rise in popularity during the war with Iran may already be fading, as pressure mounts at home to end the conflict in Gaza.

Netanyahu claimed victory over the Islamic Republic in the 12-day war that ended with a ceasefire last week, after Trump ordered US warplanes to join in bombing Iranian nuclear sites.

Political scientist Assaf Meydani, in a column on Israeli website Ynet on Saturday, said that alongside a “victory for both Trump and Netanyahu” in Iran, the Israeli leader “will have to explain a series of failures”.

Most notable among them, according to Meydani, is Netanyahu’s “failure to end the campaign in Gaza”.

“Hamas, though battered, has not been destroyed, and ‘Swords of Iron’ has become prolonged attrition,” Meydani said, using Israel’s name for its military campaign in the Gaza Strip.

“The people of Israel are strong, but tensions are simmering.”

Israelis fearful of the threat of a nuclear Iran rallied behind Netanyahu as he led the campaign against Israel’s longtime rival. Now that the war is over, domestic and international pressure has resumed to secure an end to the fighting in Gaza.

A public opinion poll published by Israel’s Kan public broadcaster the day after the ceasefire with Iran suggested a rise in support for Netanyahu.

But while his approval ratings went up compared to previous polls, 52pc of respondents in the Kan survey still said they wanted Netanyahu — Israel’s longest-serving prime minister — out of office.

Nearly two-thirds of those surveyed said they wanted the Gaza campaign to end, compared to 22pc who favoured continuing the fighting.

Israeli newspaper Maariv said on Friday that its polling showed a “surge” for Netanyahu immediately after the ceasefire with Iran had “evaporated almost entirely” within days.

In the coastal hub of Tel Aviv on Saturday, thousands of people gathered to demand a ceasefire deal that would bring home the dozens of hostages still held in Gaza.

Liri Albag, who was released from captivity in January under a short-lived truce, told the crowd that Netanyahu and Trump “made brave decisions on Iran. Now make the brave decision to end the war in Gaza and bring [the hostages] home”.

Netanyahu has also faced renewed pressure from one of his political rivals, former prime minister Naftali Bennett.

Criticising the Netanyahu government’s “inability to decide” on Gaza, Bennett called for “a comprehensive agreement that includes the release of all the hostages” to end “the terrible impasse and political confusion”.

“Netanyahu must step down. He has been in power for 20 years … that’s far too long,” Bennett told Israel’s Channel 12 in an interview that aired on Saturday.

“The people want change, they want calm,” added Bennett, who is widely expected to run for office again in the next elections, scheduled for late 2026.

Gil Dickman, a prominent activist demanding action by Israel to secure the release of the hostages, said that while “the operation in Iran was a success”, Netanyahu had “failed” to “make people forget his responsibility” for failing to prevent Hamas’s unprecedented 2023 attack.

Dickman, whose cousin Carmel Gat was killed in captivity and her body retrieved from Gaza in August, told AFP that Netanyahu’s “terrible failures and the abandonment of the hostages will not be forgotten”.

Expressing “cautious optimism” after Trump’s recent remarks, Dickman said there was “apparently an opportunity to end the war”.

“We couldn’t save my cousin, but we can still save those who are still alive in Gaza. “