Live blog: Gaza under attack

Israel have continued to carry out air strikes in Gaza early on Monday morning, with three Palestinians killed and ten injured in recent hours.

Gaza’s Ministry of Health said the death toll now stands at 2,123, including 577 children and 261 women since the offensive began on 8 July.

A spokesperson for the Israeli army said 35 air raids had been carried out in Gaza since midnight on Sunday, while rocket fire has now resumed after a lull of several hours. 

70 percent of Israeli residents in villages bordering Gaza have been evacuated amid the ongoing rocket fire from the coastal enclave.

Haaretz report that it has come in response to the death of a four-year-old boy, killed by fire from Gaza, but that Israeli officials have said not to call it an evacuation.

“We were told not to call it an evacuation, only a breather, but we should call a spade a spade. We left the kibbutz since it’s impossible to remain there,” Yael Stadin, a local resident, told Haaretz.

Saudi Arabia is said to be putting pressure on the Palestinian factions in Gaza to accept the Egyptian proposal for a ceasefire with Israel.

Turkish media report that the Saudis have pledged to “see to it” that the blockade is lifted if the deal does not lead to the siege on Gaza being ended. Saudi Arabia has been accused of being complicit with Israel in the Gaza assault, something their leaders have vehemently denied.

There is confusion over whether Palestinian groups have accepted the Egyptian proposal: Ma’an News said the factions have agreed to it while Al-Jazeera reported that Hamas have rejected the proposal once more.

The Qatar backed Hamas chief Khaled Meshaal told Iranian television on Sunday that they would not return to the Cairo talks and said “resistance” is the only method to achieve their goals.

The deaths of a woman and her four children in an Israeli air strike on Sunday resulted in the 89^th entire family to be killed during Israel’s deadly assault on Gaza.

Gaza’s Health Ministry said the killing of the Juda family in Tel Azatar in the north of the strip had wiped out all its members. They said the attack happened without warning, according to the ministry, and the five people were killed instantly.

A total of 16 Palestinians were killed in Gaza on Sunday, according to the health officials.

The live blog will close down now until 0600 GMT on Monday, when it will be back to bring you all the latest news from Israel's assault on Gaza.

Until then, here is a summary of events on Sunday:

• Footage emerged of an Israeli attack in Gaza on Saturday that destroyed a block of 40 flats leaving 18 people wounded and 60 families homeless.
• The funeral of an Israeli child killed by rocket fire took place in south Israel with hundreds of people in attendance.
• At least 13 Palestinians were killed in Israeli attacks on the coastal enclave, as strikes were reported throughout the day.
• Around 100 rockets and mortar shells were fired into Israel from Gaza, leading to the Erez crossing being closed after three Arab-Israelis were injured in an attack on the border.
• Former Hamas Justice Minister Mohammed al-Ghoul was assassinated in an attack on his car in northern Gaza by an Israeli drone.
• A woman and her three children were killed in an Israeli attack on their family home in the A-Zaatar area of the Jabaliya neighbourhood.
• The start of the school year in Gaza was delayed in an announcement by UNICEF, who said that classes cannot take place due to the ongoing Israeli offensive, while Netanyahu said schools in Israel’s south would remain closed until the operation is complete.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said schools in the south will not open for the start of the new academic year next week.

Israel Radio reported the news and said that schools "that are not adequately protected" will not open next week.

Earlier in the day Netanyahu said the Gaza offensive will continue "until its goals are achieved. I said on the first day of the operation that it can take time and we’re prepared for the possibility that the campaign will last even until after the start of the school year.”

On what was supposed to be the first day of the new school year, children in Gaza have been left disappointed.

“Classes will remain closed in the conflict-stricken coastal enclave, denying those nearly 500,000 children their right to education,” UNICEF said in a statement on Sunday.

While classes did not start as planned, UN schools being used to shelter families displaced by Israel’s assault tried to run classes and host games to raise spirits among Gaza’s young population.

“Hamas is ISIS, ISIS is Hamas,” is the cry from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Larry Defner has written scathingly of these claims in +972 magazine today:

"Anybody who isn’t a shill for Israel can see through Netanyahu’s new slogan,“Hamas is ISIS, ISIS is Hamas.” It’s such a crude attempt to brainwash people, to put the most horrifying image in their minds and associate it with Gaza, thereby cleansing Israel of those images of Gaza’s agony. Like he’s been doing his whole career, Netanyahu is insulting people’s intelligence, treating them like children, selling them the war with a short little singsong slogan they can all remember."

Some 100 rockets have been fired into Israel on Sunday, according to the Times of Israel.

Earlier, the Erez crossing was shut after a volley of mortar shells were fired at the border, seriously injuring three Israel-Arabs.

The injured had been at the crossing to collect injured family members in Gaza, who were to be transferred to hospitals in Israel for treatment.

A woman and her three children have been killed in an Israeli strike on Gaza.

Gaza's Health Ministry said the family died when in an attack on the A-Zaatar area of the Jabaliya neighbourhood.

There have been reports from the ground that Israel have carried out numerous attacks across the Gaza Strip in the past couple of hours.

Israel's army has said on Sunday that it has "struck" Mohammed al-Ghoul, who is believed to be responsible for Hamas' financial transfers, in an air strike.

Ghoul has served as Justice Minister in Gaza previously.

The army said they achieved a "direct hit" on Ghoul in Gaza, where there have been reports of an air strike on a car in a northern area that killed one and injured ten.

Hamas are yet to respond to the reports.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has told Egyptian television that he will launch a "diplomatic bombshell" this week to solve the Palestinian issue.

It will be a diplomatic and political move, according to Abbas, who says it will be a "surprise". It will not be a declaration of war on Israel, according to Haaretz, but it will be a proposal sent to US Secretary of State John Kerry that is "unlikely to receive a warm response from Washington."

He said the initiative "enjoys broad Arab support" and the announcement came after the Palestinian president visited Cairo.