Live: Hamas agrees to release 10 Israeli captives

Israeli forces arrested veteran Palestinian journalist Dr Nasser al-Lahham during a violent raid on his home in the occupied West Bank city of Bethlehem early Monday morning.

Lahham, a 58-year-old journalist with over 30 years of experience reporting from Palestine, is the editor-in-chief of Ma’an News Agency and director of Al-Mayadeen TV’s office in Palestine.

The pre-dawn raid on his home in the village of al-Duha, west of Bethlehem, was described by Al-Mayadeen as “brutal and repressive”.

According to Ma’an, Israeli soldiers stormed the house, ransacked the property, destroyed personal belongings, and confiscated computers and mobile phones before detaining the journalist.

Al-Mayadeen accused Israeli forces of spreading chaos and vandalising Lahham’s home with total disregard for privacy.

Read more: Israeli forces arrest veteran Palestinian journalist in West Bank raid
 

A group of 26 former British diplomats has written a letter to the Times newspaper urging Prime Minister Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron to recognise a Palestinian state.

The letter has been signed by former British ambassadors to numerous Middle Eastern countries, including Sir Dominick Chilcott, a former ambassador to Turkey, Peter Millett, a former ambassador to Libya and Lord Andrew Green, who was ambassador to Saudi Arabia. 

The Times published the letter on Monday morning, although the headline of the letters page online was about how "tech-free 'cloisters' can help young minds".

Signatories to the letter on recognising Palestine also include Sir William Patey, a former ambassador to Afghanistan, as well as Peter Jenkins, Sir Jeremy Greenstock and Lord David Hannay, three former ambassadors to the United Nations.

Macron is set to visit the UK on Tuesday.

Read more: Former UK diplomats urge Starmer and Macron to recognise Palestinian state

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is set to meet with US President Donald Trump at the White House on Monday.

It comes as Trump said on Sunday that there was a good chance a ceasefire deal in Gaza could be reached this week. 

Monday's trip will be Netanyahu's third White House visit since Trump returned to office in January.

Ahead of the visit, the Israeli premier told reporters he would thank Trump for the US air strikes on Iranian nuclear sites last month, and said Israeli negotiators were negotiating for a deal on Gaza in talks taking place in Doha.

Israel and Hamas are set to hold a second day of indirect talks in Qatar on Monday.

The US-backed proposal for a 60-day ceasefire includes a phased release of Israeli captives, Israeli troops withdrawing from parts of Gaza, and discussions on ending the war permanently.

Hamas has long stated that it would only free all the remaining captives once the war was completely ended and Israeli troops were fully withdrawn. Israel has said it would only end the war if Hamas is dismantled.

Two members of the Ramlaoui family were killed when their home in the al-Tuffah neighbourhood of Gaza City was hit by an Israeli air strike on Monday afternoon, Wafa news agency reported.

Several other family members were wounded in the attack. 

Earlier in the day, two civilians were killed and nearly 20 others wounded when Israeli forces opened fire near an aid distribution point in Rafah. Starving Palestinians had gathered there in search of food and supplies.

In northern Gaza, an Israeli drone strike killed one Palestinian in Jabalia refugee camp.

Elsewhere, several causalities were reported following Israeli shelling of a school housing displaced people in the al-Zeitoun neighbourhood of Gaza City, and an apartment in al-Shati refugee camp, west of the city.

The death toll from Israel’s war on Gaza since October 2023 has risen to 57,418. At least 136,261 others have been wounded since then. 

US Special Envoy Thomas Barrack said on Monday that he was "unbelievably satisfied" with the Lebanese government's reply to an American proposal on how to disarm Hezbollah, which had signalled in recent days that it will not give up all its arms.

"What the government gave us was something spectacular in a very short period of time. I'm unbelievably satisfied with the response," Barrack told reporters after meeting Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, without giving details of the response.

Aoun's team gave Barrack a seven-page reply to his 19 June proposal.

Groups representing US university professors are set to go to trial as they seek to protect international students and faculty engaged in pro-Palestinian advocacy from deportation under the Trump administration's immigration agenda.

A two-week non-jury trial in the professors' case scheduled to kick off on Monday in Boston marks a rarity in the hundreds of lawsuits that have been filed nationally challenging President Donald Trump's efforts to carry out mass deportations, slash spending and reshape the federal government.

In many of those cases, judges have issued quick rulings early on in the proceedings without any witnesses being called to testify. But US District Judge William Young, in keeping with his long-standing practice, instead ordered a trial in the professors' case, saying it was the "best way to get at truth".

The lawsuit was filed in March after immigration authorities arrested recent Columbia University graduate Mahmoud Khalil, the first target of Trump's effort to deport non-citizen students with pro-Palestinian views.

Since then, the administration has cancelled the visas of hundreds of other students and scholars and ordered the arrest of some.

Reporting by Reuters

At least 20 Palestinians were killed in Israeli attacks across Gaza on Wednesday, Al Jazeera reported, citing medical sources.

Six people were killed when Israeli forces struck the al-Rimal clinic in central Gaza City, while two Palestinians were killed and many others wounded in an Israeli attack on a house in the al-Bureij refugee camp.

Emergency service officials said three Palestinians were also killed and another 40 wounded by Israeli gunfire near an aid distribution centre north of Rafah.

The Israeli military arrested the editor in chief of the Palestinian Ma'an news agency, Dr Nasser Laham, this morning at his home in the village of Al-Duheisha, near Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank, the agency said.

"Israeli forces arrested journalist Dr Nasser Laham after storming his home in Bethlehem. His home was entirely ransacked and electronic devices and mobile phones were confiscated," a message posted on his Meta page said.

Laham also serves as the manager of the Lebanese channel Al-Mayadeen's offices in the West Bank.

He is expected to be brought to Ofer military court on Thursday for a hearing on the extension of his detention, according to Haaretz.

The controversial US-backed initiative to distribute aid in Gaza, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), says it started distributing food again after it suspended operations on Sunday, claiming two US contractors were hurt in an attack at one of its sites, according to Al Jazeera.

At least 750 Palestinians have been killed by attacks targeting the aid distribution sites since 27 May.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres renewed his call for a two-state solution between Israel and Palestine.

Speaking at the BRICS summit in Brazil, Guterres said peace also requires an immediate and sustained ceasefire in Gaza, the unconditional release of captives, unimpeded humanitarian access, and an end to violence and occupation of the West Bank.

He also voiced concern over the growing weaponisation of artificial intelligence, warning that “peace is more urgent than ever” and calling for a global governance framework rooted in justice and human rights.

At least 13 people have been killed by Israeli attacks across Gaza today, according to Al Jazeera, citing local hospital officials.

A group of French lawyers and jurists filed an urgent request with the Administrative Court of Montreuil, France, to suspend the military cargo in transit through France’s Roissy-Charles de Gaulle airport to Elbit Systems in Israel from Swedish company Swebor Stal Svenska AB.

“Elbit Systems, the main arms supplier to the Israeli army, plays a central role in the current war effort, including in the Gaza Strip,” the Jurists for the Respect of International Law (Jurdi) said in a statement shared on X.

“Authorising the uncontrolled transit of armoured vehicles destined for Elbit Systems would be equivalent to facilitating, from French territory, the commission of international crimes already denounced by the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court,” the group said.

Israeli attacks killed at least nine people overnight in Gaza, according to Al Jazeera, citing hospital sources.

Al-Shifa Hospital said six people were killed, including a child, and 15 others wounded in an attack on a clinic in Gaza City’s Remal neighbourhood.

One person was killed and others injured in the bombing of an apartment in Gaza City’s Tal al-Hawa, the hospital said.

A medical source at Al-Aqsa Martyrs and al-Awda Hospital reported that an attack on a house in the Bureij refugee camp in central Gaza killed two Palestinians and wounded others.

Good morning Middle East Eye readers,

Here are the latest updates on Israel's war on Gaza and key developments in the occupied West Bank:

• The first session of indirect Hamas-Israel ceasefire talks in Qatar ended inconclusively, two Palestinian sources familiar with the matter told Reuters early on Monday, adding that the Israeli delegation didn't have a sufficient mandate to reach an agreement with Hamas.

• US President Donald Trump on Sunday said there was a good chance a Gaza ceasefire deal could be reached with Hamas this week, and such a deal meant "quite a few hostages" could be released.

• A Hamas government media office rejected accusations by the US State Department that the group was involved in a Saturday attack that injured two Americans at an aid distribution site in Gaza, it said on Sunday.

• Israel's military said it would issue 54,000 call-up notices to ultra-Orthodox Jewish seminary students following a Supreme Court ruling mandating their conscription and amid growing pressure from reservists stretched by extended deployments.

• Israel said early Monday that it carried out a wave of strikes on the Yemeni port city of Hodeida and other areas held by the Houthis.

• Israeli forces have killed at least 82 people across Gaza, including 39 in Gaza City alone on Sunday, according to Al Jazeera.

Our live coverage from Gaza will shortly be closing until tomorrow morning.

Here are some of the day's key developments:

• Gaza’s Ministry of Health says hospitals across the territory have received 80 bodies and treated 304 people for injuries over the past 24 hours, as Israel’s assault continues.

• Since the start of Israel’s war on Gaza on 7 October 2023, the death toll has now climbed to 57,418, with 136,261 injured, according to the ministry.

• Gaza’s Health Ministry says eight people have been killed by Israel and more than 40 wounded in incidents linked to aid distribution in the past 24 hours alone.

• The figures bring the total number of Palestinians killed while trying to access food and essential aid to 751, with at least 4,931 wounded since the war began.

• Israeli warplanes have carried out a wave of air strikes across Lebanon, hitting several regions from the east to the south of the country, according to local media and video shared online.

• Brazil’s President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has called on the international community to take a stand against Israel’s genocide in Gaza.

• “We cannot remain indifferent to the genocide carried out by Israel in Gaza, the indiscriminate killing of innocent civilians and the use of hunger as a weapon of war,” Lula told the BRICS summit in Rio de Janeiro on Sunday.

• Yemen's Houthis said on Sunday that the group carried out an attack on Israel's Ben Gurion Airport, stating that it caused "millions to flee shelters and halting air traffic".

• The Freedom Flotilla Coalition says it is preparing to launch another aid mission to Gaza, weeks after Israeli forces seized one of its vessels in international waters.