Israel-Palestine live: Israel and Palestinians agree to truce, hostage deal

Gaza's border authority announced on Saturday that the Rafah land crossing into Egypt would reopen on Sunday for foreign passport holders, according to Reuters. 

Evacuations from the Gaza Strip into Egypt for foreign citizens and Palestinians needing urgent medical treatment were suspended on Friday, three Egyptian security sources and a Palestinian official said.
 

Avi Dichter, the Israeli minister of agriculture and former minister of internal security called the ongoing war “the Nakba of Gaza 2023,” on Saturday.

The minister made the comments on a live interview on the Israeli Channel 12. 
 

A demonstration has broken out in Tel Aviv, with families of hostages taken to Gaza on 7 October, denouncing Israel’s government, according to Haaretz. 

Jacky Levy, whose family was abducted from Nir Oz, said: “They ask us who our rage is directed at, and it is all of humanity… but mainly, those who are responsible for us, those who have a contract with us,the government of Israel,” he said.
 

MEE’s contributor in Gaza, Maha Hussaini, said that Israeli tanks are approaching the al-Quds Hospital in the south west of the besieged enclave.

“An eyewitness there told me they are randomly bombing the densely-populated area,” she said, on social media platform X. 
 

Palestine’s government media office announced on Saturday that the death toll in Gaza has now reached 11,100, with at least 8,000 of those being women and children. 

An additional 28,000 have been wounded since the start of the war on 7 October. 
 

Doctor Mohammed Obeid, a surgeon in Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza, says that Israeli attacks have intensified, with a sniper targeting four patients. 

In a voice recording published by Doctors Without Borders, he says “one of them has a gunshot directly in his neck and the other in the abdomen."

Obeid also explains that the Internet and communications have been cut, while those who are trying to go too the south were also bombed.

“They have bombed al-Shifa since the morning, there is no electricity, there is no water, there is no food, our team is exhausted,” he says.

Abu Ubaida, the spokesperson for the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas, said on Saturday that they have destroyed 160 Israeli military vehicles since the start of the Israeli ground offensive in Gaza, including 25 in the last 24 hours.

He said that this took place in Beit Hanun, and north west Gaza, close to al-Karama. 

Palestine’s Red Crescent announced on Saturday that only seven out of 18 of their ambulances are functioning in Gaza. 

The damaged vehicles were destroyed in Israeli bombing on the besieged enclave. 

“The remaining vehicles are at risk of completely ceasing operations in the coming hours due to fuel depletion,” the organisation said. 

Civil defence crews and Red Crescent teams have been unable to respond properly to emergencies due to ongoing air strikes and roads blocked with rubble from bombed buildings. 
 

Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan said that any talk about the future of Gaza should only be about an immediate ceasefire, during  a joint Arab-Islamic press conference on Saturday. 

"The only future, and this is the unifying position of the Arab [world], is an immediate ceasefire,” he said.
 

The Middle East Regional Director for the Norwegian Refugee Council, Angelita Caredda, said that she is “horrified by reports of relentless attacks on Gaza’s hospitals,” in a statement. 

“Patients, including babies, and civilians seeking relief are trapped under attack. It is an affront to wage war around and on hospitals. Those being treated or seeking shelter in hospitals have nowhere else to go,” she added. 
 

Around 21,000 people took part in a pro-Palestinian rally in Brussels on Saturday, police said, many chanting slogans such as "Free Palestine" and demanding a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip as they marched peacefully through the city, according to Reuters. 

"What is happening right now in Gaza is beyond devastating," one demonstrator told the news agency, carrying a poster that read "Ceasefire now!" 

Other protesters held up posters that read "Stop the Genocide", "Human Rights for Palestinians" or demanded the arrest of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over what they called war crimes.
 

A spokesperson for the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) said on Saturday that “every day that passes pushes more and more people closer to starvation.”

Israel has repeatedly bombed bakeries and markets around the Strip, and cut off all food, water, electricity and fuel since 9 October, leaving people with no access to food. 

Aid has also been slow to trickle in, with bombings at the Rafah border hampering efforts for aid to come in. 

Thousands of people gathered in France’s capital, Paris, calling for a “stop to the massacre in Gaza” on Saturday.

The protesters demanded for France to call for a ceasefire, according to AFP. 

"I came to support the Palestinian cause, for a ceasefire in Gaza," Ahlem Triki, an enegineer, told the news agency.

Similar rallies took place in Canada, South Africa, London and Spain. 

Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said that Gaza’s al-Shifa Hospital has been “hit several times,  including the maternity and outpatient departments, resulting in multiple deaths and injuries.”

The reports confirm what doctors inside the hospital told Middle East Eye earlier today.

MSF reiterated their calls for a ceasefire and an end to attacks on the hospital, which is one of the main and biggest ones in the Strip. 

Israel has targeted dozens of mosques and churches in the Gaza Strip as part of its ongoing assault, which is now in its second month, Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor said in a new statement on Saturday. 

“Israel’s bombing of places of worship is in clear violation of international humanitarian law and the laws of war,”the organisation said.

According to the Geneva-based human rights group, recent Israeli attacks have resulted in the total destruction of 66 mosques and partial damage to 146 others, accounting for approximately 20 percent of all mosques in the Gaza Strip. Additionally, three historic churches have suffered damage in various areas of the Strip.