Live: Hamas agrees to release 10 Israeli captives

At least 25 Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire as they waited to receive humanitarian aid near the so-called Netzarim Corridor, Al Jazeera reported, citing Gaza medical sources.

Good morning Middle East Eye readers, 

Here are the latest updates from Israel's war on Gaza:

• US Secretary of State Marco Rubio condemned the sanctions imposed Tuesday by Britain and other nations against two Israeli cabinet members accused of repeatedly inciting violence against Palestinians.

• Washington's ambassador to Israel said he did not think an independent Palestinian state remains a US foreign policy goal, prompting the State Department to say he spoke for himself while the White House referred to past comments from President Donald Trump expressing doubts about a two-state solution.

• Israel's Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich ordered on Tuesday the cancellation of a waiver on cooperation between Israeli and Palestinian banks, in a move that puts the Palestinian banking system at risk.

• Senior Hamas official Mohammad Mardawi accused Prime Minister Netanyahu of "continuing to lie," saying his statements are "merely an illusion, designed to mislead the Israeli public and prevent the signing of a genuine deal," as Netanyahu announced significant progress on the issue of the captives.

• Al-Quds Hospital said six killed and more than 95 injured in Israeli attacks on aid-seeking Palestinians near the Nabulsi area and the so-called Netzarim axis southwest of Gaza City.

• Al-Awda Hospital in Gaza's Nuseirat said it received bodies of seven people and 112 injured Palestinians as a result of the Israeli attacks targeting civilian gatherings in the areas surrounding the so-called "Netzarim" checkpoint in the central Gaza Strip.

• Five unidentified bodies have been held at Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital since yesterday, medical sources reported.

Climate and political activist Greta Thunberg returned home to Sweden on Tuesday after she was deported from Israel.

Thunberg was deported after Israeli security forces intercepted a boat carrying her and 11 other activists attempting to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza and break the Israeli blockade on the Palestinian territory.

Asked in Stockholm if she was scared when the security forces boarded the Madleen sailboat, Thunberg deflected attention away from herself to the situation in Gaza: "What I'm afraid of is that people are silent during an ongoing genocide".

"What I feel most is concern for the continued violations of international law and war crimes that Israel is guilty of," Thunberg told reporters.

She accused Israel of carrying out a "systematic genocide" and "systematic starvation of over two million people" in Gaza.

"We must act, we must demand that our government acts, and we must act ourselves when our complicit governments do not step up," the 22-year-old said.

Of the 12 people on board the Madleen carrying food and supplies for Gaza, eight were taken into custody after they refused to leave Israel voluntarily. 

Four others, including Thunberg, were deported.

All of them have been banned from Israel for 100 years, according to the rights group that legally represents some of them.

Several rights groups including Amnesty International have accused Israel of genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza but Israel vehemently rejects the term.

US President Donald Trump told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during a call on Monday that he wants to see an end to the war in Gaza and attacking Iran’s nuclear sites is off limits, according to Israel’s Channel 12, multiple media outlets reported on Tuesday

Details of the call have not been publicly shared by either leader and unnamed sources say that Trump allegedly told Netanyahu that he expects him to end the war in Gaza altogether.

Trump reportedly said that ending the war would aid negotiations with Iran and Saudi Arabia.

Trump also clarified that the US-Iran nuclear talks are ongoing despite his disapproval of Iran’s latest response.

According to two sources familiar with the details of the conversation, Trump refused to discuss military strikes on Iran until talks failed.

Former Scottish First Minister Humza Yousaf has heavily criticised David Cameron after Middle East Eye revealed on Monday that the former UK foreign secretary privately threatened to defund and withdraw from the International Criminal Court if it issued arrest warrants for Israeli leaders.

Cameron, then foreign secretary in Rishi Sunak’s Conservative government, made the threat in April 2024 in a heated phone call with Karim Khan, the British chief prosecutor of the court.

"It is shameful that Lord Cameron allegedly threatened the ICC for having the audacity to do their job," Yousaf, who was the Scottish first minister when Cameron made the threat, told MEE on Tuesday in a significant intervention.

"He should immediately come clean and apologise if this was indeed the case.

"These revelations show that the UK Government, under both the Conservatives and Labour, are complicit in the atrocities we are witnessing in Gaza."

Yousaf strongly opposed the Conservative government's support for Israel's bombardment of Gaza and called for an arms embargo on Israel in February 2024.

Members of his wife's family were in Gaza when the war began in October 2023.

Cameron, a former British prime minister, was appointed foreign secretary in November 2023.

Yousaf, a member of the Scottish National Party, served as Scotland's first minister from March 2023 to May 2024. 

You can read more here.

The Trump administration condemned “extremely unhelpful” sanctions against far-right Israeli ministers Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich instituted by the UK, Canada, Australia, Norway, and New Zealand on Tuesday.

State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said that “it will do nothing to get us closer to a ceasefire in Gaza”.

Bruce added that the countries should focus on the “real culprit, which is Hamas”.

“We remain concerned about any step that would further isolate Israel from the international community," she said. "If our allies want to help, they should focus on supporting special envoy [Steve] Witkoff’s negotiations and backing the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation when it comes to food and aid.”

The sanctions against National Security Minister Gvir and Finance Minister Smotrich are over "their repeated incitement of violence against Palestinian communities" in Gaza and in the occupied West Bank.

Attacks by Israeli settlers on Palestinians have been taking place on a near-daily basis, and the head of the police’s West Bank division is currently under investigation for not doing anything to curry favour with Ben Gvir.

The two Israeli ministers have opposed the entry of international aid into Gaza and repeatedly advocated for the forced expulsion of Palestinians from the territory, with Ben Gvir calling for Israel to "encourage the voluntary emigration of the residents of Gaza".

At least 15 people were killed on Tuesday when Israeli quadcopters fired at people waiting to enter a food distribution centre, according to the AFP.

Gaza civil defence agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP that 12 people were killed when Israeli quadcopters opened fire on people waiting to enter a Gaza Humanitarian Foundation distribution centre in central Gaza, "at 6 or 7 am" on Tuesday.

Bassal added that another three people were killed by Israeli fire and shelling north of Wadi Gaza between 2:30 am and 5am on Tuesday local time as they waited to enter the same distribution centre.

"Several thousand civilians and hungry individuals had gathered in the hope of reaching the American aid centre near the Wadi Gaza bridge and the Netzarim corridor", Bassal told AFP.

The Israeli military acknowledged that it had fired "warning shots" during an incident near a food centre on Tuesday, but said the number of wounded did not match its data.

It said in a statement that "troops fired warning shots to distance suspects who were advancing in the area of Wadi Gaza and posed a threat to the troops".

"The warning shots were fired hundreds of metres from the aid distribution site, prior to its opening hours and toward the suspects who posed a threat to the troops."

The military did not mention quadcopters firing at a crowd.

Al-Awda hospital in central Gaza's Nuseirat camp said it had received three bodies and 100 wounded from the incident near the Wadi Gaza bridge.

There have been a series of killings of civilians lining up for aid since the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation first opened aid distribution points in Gaza on 27 May, with 110 people shot dead by the Israeli military as of Sunday.

At least 16 Palestinians have been injured and two killed after the Israeli military continued a large-scale attack on Nablus in the West Bank, according to AFP on Tuesday.

Both Nidal Amira, 40, and Khaled Amira, 35, were reportedly killed in the attacks.

The Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) said that at least three people sustained injuries from bullets, four from physical assault, and dozens more from tear gas inhalation.

Ambulance crews were prevented from reaching the injured, according to the PRCS.

This is the third year in a row that a large-scale operation targeting people in the old city has taken place.

Almost 1,000 people have been killed in the West Bank since October 2023.

Houthis in Yemen launched a ballistic missile at Israel on Tuesday.

The missile was intercepted by the Israeli military.

The Houthis have been launching missiles at Israel in order to pressure the country to end its assault and aid blockade on Gaza.

Since 18 March, when Israel broke a ceasefire agreement, the Houthis in Yemen have launched 48 ballistic missiles and a minimum of 11 drones at Israel, according to The Times of Israel.

Medical officials told Al Jazeera Arabic that Palestinians are fainting in the streets of Gaza from extreme hunger, amid an absence of food, the network reported on Tuesday. 

Israel has imposed a blockade of clean water, food, fuel and humanitarian aid on the Gaza Strip since the beginning of March, leaving virtually all Palestinians in Gaza subject to famine-like conditions.

Israeli advocacy organisation Peace Now condemned US ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee’s comments on Tuesday that the US no longer fully supports the establishment of a Palestinian State, the Times of Israel reported on Tuesday.

Peace Now, which supports a two-state solution, accused Huckabee of seeking to “realize his religious fantasies” due to his ties to the Evangelical movement.

“This is not an ambassador, this is an Evangelist who is dreaming of the war of Gog and Magog in the Middle East in order to realize his religious fantasies,” the organisation said.

“It can only be hoped that President Trump will prove that he is a friend of Israel, repudiate the comments of the ambassador, which contradict the position of the US, his vision for the region, and the Israeli interest.”

Peace Now also lambasted Huckabee for intervening in Israeli politics after he attempted to stop the ultra-Orthodox parties from voting to dissolve the Knesset on Monday.

Huckabee made his comments during an interview with Bloomberg. He also said there was “no room” for a Palestinian state in the West Bank and suggested Israel’s “Muslim neighbors” give up their land to create one.

Read more on Mike Huckabee’s comments here.

France has been supplying Israel an “uninterrupted” flow of arms since October 2023, according to a report by a group of ten non-governmental organisations (NGOs), Andalou Agency reported on Tuesday. 

The report says that military equipment was exported from France to Israel in two separate categories: bombs, grenades, torpedoes, mines, missiles, and other munitions of war; plus rocket launchers, hand grenades, flamethrowers, artillery, military rifles, hunting rifle parts and accessories. It underscored that over 15 million items in the first category and 1,868 items in the second were delivered to Israel.

The report also noted that the total value of the deliveries exceeds $10.3m, calling for further investigations to determine the final use of the materials in question.

It added that parts for the F-35 fighter jet had been sent from the US to Israel via the Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris.

 The NGOs, which produced the report, include Stop Arming Israel France, the Palestinian Youth Movement, and the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions campaign.

The US ambassador to Israel has told Bloomberg that the US no longer wholeheartedly endorses an independent state for Palestinians.

“Unless there are some significant things that happen that change the culture, there’s no room for it,” Mike Huckabee told Bloomberg in Jerusalem, adding that a Palestinian state won't happen "in our lifetime".

He further said that a Palestinian state wouldn't necessarily need to be based in the occupied West Bank. 

"Does it have to be in Judea and Samaria?” Huckabee, said, using the biblical name the Israeli government uses to refer to the West Bank.

Huckabee's comments come days after France and the UK abandoned previous plans to recognise a Palestinian state at an upcoming conference.

France had been lobbying the UK and other European allies to recognise a Palestinian state at the conference in New York, due to be held between 17 and 20 June.

Israeli forces launched a wide-scale military raid in the heart of the occupied West Bank city of Nablus on Tuesday, in what local sources describe as the largest such incursion in more than two years.

Israeli forces opened fire at Palestinians, including a paramedic, deployed tear gas, arrested several individuals, and violently raided homes during the ongoing incursion. 

Footage shared by local media showed a Palestinian man with his hands raised approaching Israeli soldiers before a scuffle ensued and gunshots were heard in the background.

Israeli media reported that two Palestinians were killed after allegedly attempting to seize a soldier's weapon. Palestinian authorities have yet to confirm the deaths.

Mujahed Tabanja, a journalist at the scene, told Middle East Eye the two men were shot while trying to return to their homes in the Old City. Ambulances were blocked from reaching them. 

Read more: Israel launches large-scale Nablus raid with fears of prolonged assault

Students, faculty and alumni held a protest on Tuesday to demand the University of Oxford drops disciplinary hearings against 13 student protesters who were arrested at a sit-in of the vice-chancellor's office more than a year ago.

In a statement, Oxford Action for Palestine (OA4P) described the disciplinary process against the activists as being "protracted and opaque", lasting over 10 months after a police investigation was dropped. It added that it has been based on "probably false accusations against protesters for 'violent' and 'threatening' behaviour despite CCTV evidence to the contrary".

The group added that activists' arrests were "marked by unprecedented levels of police brutality" and that university employees have "utilised racist, anti-Palestinian language, suggesting that the keffiyeh, a symbol of Palestinian liberation, is synonymous with terrorism".