Live: Gaza death toll nears 50,700
Live Updates
Our liveblog is now closed until tomorrow morning.
Here are the day's key developments:
- Israel has announced what it called a "targeted" ground offensive in Gaza as Defence Minister Israel Katz said it was the "last warning" for Hamas to release the captives. In a video statement, Katz said the Palestinians should follow the advice of US President Donald Trump and remove Hamas from power.
- Israel’s military is once again telling Palestinians in eastern Gaza to flee - or face the consequences. For the second day in a row, Avichay Adraee, the army’s Arabic-language spokesperson, has ordered residents of Beit Hanoun, Khirbet Khuza’a, Abasan al-Kabira, and Abasan al-Jadida to leave immediately.
- Palestinian health officials in Gaza report a devastating toll from Israel’s latest air strikes, with 436 people killed and 678 wounded since Monday night. Among the dead are 183 children and 94 women, according to the health ministry.
- The UN on Wednesday said that a staff member was killed and five others injured after a suspected air strike hit a UN building in Deir al-Balah, in central Gaza.
- In a statement issued on Wednesday, the Palestinian Ministry of Health warned of a "near-total collapse" of the Gaza health system as Israel resumes its war on the enclave and continues its attacks on the West Bank.
- French President Emmanuel Macron announced late on Wednesday that he has spoken to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, and the two leaders agreed to host a "conference on the two-state solution" for Israel and Palestine.
French President Emmanuel Macron announced late on Wednesday that he has spoken to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, and the two leaders agreed to host a "conference on the two-state solution" for Israel and Palestine.
"We condemn the resumption of Israeli strikes on Gaza," Macron wrote in a post on X.
"We will work together to reopen a much-needed political horizon. The conference on the two-state solution, which we will co-chair, must help revive a political perspective for both Israelis and Palestinians," Macron said.
He did not specify a date for the event.
I just spoke with Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
— Emmanuel Macron (@EmmanuelMacron) March 19, 2025
I welcomed his Jeddah initiative, which enabled the start of peace negotiations in Ukraine.
Regarding the Middle East, we condemn the resumption of Israeli strikes on Gaza.…
Israel’s sudden resumption of its war on Gaza has killed at least 436 Palestinianssince Tuesday, according to the local health ministry.
Israel says it is targeting Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad targets, but nearly 42 percent of the victims have been children.
Social media is awash with people mourning children killed by attacks over the past two days.
“Israel may kill us at will, burn us alive, and tear us apart, but it will never succeed in uprooting us from our land,” Ramy Abdu, a prominent human rights worker who lost nephews and nieces on Tuesday, said on X.
“Justice and accountability await - no matter how long it takes.”
Read more: At least 183 Palestinian children have been killed since Tuesday morning
Protesters against the war on Gaza are gathering outside of Trump Tower in New York City on Wednesday evening local time.
This is the second day in a row that a mass pro-Palestine protest has taken place in the borough of Manhattan.
Hamas has urged the international community to take a clear position on Israel's targeting of aid workers in Gaza, calling Wednesday's attack on UN personnel a "heinous crime".
"The latest heinous crime the Israeli occupation carried out was the targeting of a building in central Gaza's Deir al-Balah used by foreign workers in UN agencies, and resulted in the killing of one international employee and the injury of five others," Hamas said in a statement.
"This crime is not only a blatant violation of international humanitarian law but also part of the occupation’s systematic policy of targeting civilians and aid workers," the group added.
"We call on the international community and the United Nations and its institutions to take a clear and decisive stand against this heinous crime, condemn the fascist actions of terrorist Netanyahu's government, and work seriously to hold it accountable for its crimes against humanity," the statement said.
"We also emphasise the urgent need for immediate action in every possible way to provide relief to our people in Gaza and break the unjust siege imposed on them."
In a fourth wave of US air strikes on Yemen on Wednesday under President Donald Trump, residents told the Reuters news agency that the targets included the al-Jarraf district of the capital, Sanaa.
The strikes also targeted an under-construction occasions hall in a residential neighbourhood in the al-Thawra directorate in Sanaa, injuring nine people, most of whom were women and children, the spokesperson for the health ministry said in a post on X.
Local media also reported strikes on the al-Suwaidia directorate in southern Yemen.
On Tuesday, the Houthis said they had fired a ballistic missile towards Israel and would expand their range of targets in that country in the coming days in retaliation for renewed Israeli air strikes on Gaza.
US State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce told reporters on Wednesday that the US will "stand with Israel in every circumstance" and that it is "a shame that Hamas has allowed" the war on Gaza to resume.
"We deplore the loss of life, as do the Israelis. These are things that are happening that none of us want to continue. And so it's always.... difficult, but those conversations are ongoing, and of course, we stand with Israel in every circumstance. They are our ally," Bruce said of the last 24 hours in Gaza, where some 450 Palestinians were killed due to Israeli attacks.
"President Trump has one term, and his focus has clearly been peace on this planet in every single fashion," she added. "He's known to get results. He's known to be serious. And we're seeing it move forward. So it's a shame that Hamas has allowed this to occur."
Bruce repeatedly pointed to Hamas's rejection of the US envoy's "bridge proposal", which would have seen Israel get back all its captives from Gaza, but Hamas maintained that all parties should have moved on to the second phase of the ceasefire deal as originally agreed, with the built-in captive swaps.
"It was not a dynamic that was clearly going to end well in their rejecting it, but they did so anyway. And it's a horrible result of more decisions by Hamas that continue the suffering," Bruce told reporters.
In a statement issued on Wednesday, the Palestinian Ministry of Health warned of a "near-total collapse" of the Gaza health system as Israel resumes its war on the enclave and continues its attacks on the West Bank.
"We warn of the health catastrophe in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank due to the ongoing Israeli aggression," the statement read.
"The health system in Gaza is in a state of near-total collapse, with more than 80% of hospitals and medical centers out of service. Hospitals and medical centers in the West Bank are under tremendous pressure, and Israeli restrictions on movement are severely hampering the delivery of medical aid and essential supplies."
Just hours after a third round of US air strikes on Yemen, US President Donald Trump said on Wednesday that the Houthis will be "completely annihalated" whether they continue to receive arms from Iran or not.
"Reports are coming in that while Iran has lessened its intensity on Military Equipment and General Support to the Houthis, they are still sending large levels of Supplies. Iran must stop the sending of these Supplies IMMEDIATELY," Trump wrote on his TruthSocial platform.
"Let the Houthis fight it out themselves. Either way they lose, but this way they lose quickly," he said. "Tremendous damage has been inflicted upon the Houthi barbarians, and watch how it will get progressively worse — It’s not even a fair fight, and never will be. They will be completely annihilated!"
The Houthis had warned for days that if Israel resumes its war on Gaza, the group will resume its naval blockade in the Red Sea and attacks on Israel.
The United Nations secretary general condemned on Wednesday attacks on UN personnel and added in a statement from his spokesperson that all parties in Israel's attack on Gaza knew where the UN's premises were based.
"The Secretary-General was deeply saddened and shocked to learn of the death of a United Nations Office for Project Services staff member, when two UN guesthouses in Deir al Balah were hit in strikes," a spokesperson for secretary general Antonio Guterres wrote.
"The locations of all UN premises are known to the parties to the conflict, who are bound by international law to protect them and maintain their absolute inviolability," the statement continued.
"The Secretary-General sends his deepest condolences to the family of the staff member killed," he said, adding that at least 280 UN staff had been killed in Gaza since 7 Oct 2023.
- Reporting by Reuters
As Israeli ground forces re-enter Gaza through the Netzarim Corridor, is it now planning to fully implement its "five fingers" plan to slice up Gaza?
🚨Israeli forces just began reoccupying the Netzarim corridor in Gaza, re-dissecting it into 2 halves
— Muhammad Shehada (@muhammadshehad2) March 19, 2025
Israel has now fully violated every clause of the ceasefire agreement's phase 1
They're now reimplementing the "5 fingers" policy of dividing Gaza into concentration camps👇 pic.twitter.com/pnFhrrsYt2
The strategy, according to Haaretz, stems from the 1970s when the idea for the Netzarim Corridor - isolating Gaza's north - was drawn up.
Palestinian journalist Muhammed Shehada explains further in a piece for the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) from December:
"The IDF is pursuing a 'five fingers' strategy which aims to fragment Gaza into small, isolated, and overcrowded enclaves. Key to this is the establishment of broad Israeli 'corridors' with Israeli checkpoints to control Palestinian movement and serve as a launchpad for regular Israeli raids into the rest of Gaza.
"This would in effect replicate the way Israel has sought to control the West Bank through its territorial fragmentation. These corridors require the large-scale demolition of Palestinian homes, mass displacement, and the construction of new Israeli infrastructure."
The Israeli army said it had "taken control and expanded their presence up to the central Netzarim Corridor" as it announced a renewed ground offensive in Gaza.
"Over the past 24 hours, IDF (military) forces have begun targeted ground operations in the central and southern Gaza Strip to expand the security perimeter and create a partial buffer between the north and south of the Strip," the army said in a statement on Wednesday.
Israel has announced what it called a "targeted" ground offensive in Gaza as Defence Minister Israel Katz said it was the "last warning" for Hamas to release the captives.
In a video statement, Katz said the Palestinians should follow the advice of US President Donald Trump and remove Hamas from power.
"Take the advice of the president of the United States. Return the hostages and remove Hamas, and other options will open up for you - including the possibility of leaving for other places in the world for those who want to," he said.
The UN on Wednesday said that a staff member was killed and five others injured after a suspected air strike hit a UN building in Deir al-Balah, in central Gaza.
In a statement, the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS) said that an explosive ordinance was dropped or fired at the infrastructure and detonated inside the building, but at this stage, they did not know exactly.
“This was not an accident; this was an incident. What’s happening in Gaza is unconscionable," said UNOPS executive director Jorge Moreira da Silva.
"I am shocked and devastated by this tragic news. I saw the absolute dedication of our team in Gaza last month. They and other UN workers and premises should never be targeted. My sincere condolences to all those affected."
Two people, including one UN employee, died in a suspected Israeli strike on one of the body's buildings in Deir el-Balah in the Gaza Strip.
A UN source told AFP on Wednesday one of those killed was an employee of the UN Office for Project Services (UNOPS).
