Israel and Hamas exchange fire on the Israel-Gaza border on Thursday night as the Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu instructs the military to begin a ground offensive in Gaza. Israel's decision to move troops into Gaza follows clashes earlier in the day as a temporary humanitarian ceasefire ended Guardian
We're going to wrap our coverage for the day, with key developments below:
Gaza Ministry of Health says 296 have been killed in Gaza (including 71 children) and more than 2,200 wounded, as the second night of Israel's ground offensive begins. One Israeli soldier has been killed in the fighting
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon will be heading to the Middle East on Saturday, "to help mediate the conflict in Gaza between Israel and Hamas," a UN official said at the emergency session on Gaza on Friday. US Ambassador to the UN Samantha Power reiterated Obama's earlier plea for a return to the 2012 ceasefire
UN aid agencies have have stepped up emergency aid to Gaza, where the ground assault has worsened preexisting water shortages and sewage contamination. This comes as UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, said the number of displaced Gazans has almost doubled in the past 24 hours
Hamas is facing increasing pressure to accept an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. Abbas held talks with representatives of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad; he later flew to Istanbul to meet with Turkish prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
At least three journalists have been injured by Israeli airstrikes in Gaza, the Committee to Protect Journalists reports:
The Israel Defense Forces know where media outlets are located in Gaza and must ensure that they are not hit as part of its offensive," said CPJ Middle East and North Africa Program Coordinator Sherif Mansour. ""Attacking media outlets is a violation of international law and denies journalists their right to protection as civilians in war zone."
Three flares sent by Israeli army illuminate the eastern part of Gaza City. Photograph:Thomas Coex/AFP/Getty Images Photograph: Thomas Coex/AFP/Getty Images
Israel warned it could broaden a Gaza ground assault aimed at smashing Hamas's network of cross-border tunnels. Photograph: Hosam Salem /NurPhoto /REX Photograph: Hosam Salem/NurPhoto/REX
An Israeli boy jumps in a bomb shelter on July 18, 2014 in Ashkelon, Israel. Photograph: UPI/Landov/Barcroft Media Photograph: UPI /Landov / Barcroft Media
Israeli combat soldiers walk towards a staging area in southern Israel near the border with Gaza. Photograph: Xinhua News Agency/REX Photograph: Xinhua News Agency/REX
A injured man after an Israeli airstrike in Gaza. Photograph: Hosam Salem/NurPhoto/REX Photograph: Hosam Salem/NurPhoto/REX
At Nasser hospital in the heavily bombarded Khan Younis neighborhood in southern Gaza, doctors and nurses are working 24-hour shifts, overwhelmed by the amount of patients streaming through hospital doors, AFP's Sara Hussein reports:
A Palestinian man is treated at Nasser hospital in Khan Yunis. Photograph: Annibale Greco /Corbis Photograph: Annibale Greco/Corbis
The situation is very, very difficult," said doctor Kamel Zaqzuq. "This is much, much more difficult than the last war," he said, referring to the previous major conflict between Israel and Hamas militants in November 2012.
At night, it's one constant emergency.
He said the hospital was running short on some supplies, including medical sutures for stitches.
Many of those who arrived at the hospital on Thursday night and early Friday morning, after the ground operation began, were children, he said.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon will head to the Middle East on Saturday, "to help mediate the conflict in Gaza between Israel and Hamas," a UN official said at the emergency session on Gaza on Friday.
US ambassador to the UN Samantha Power now speaks:
"This is no way for anyone to live. Not for Palestinians not for Israelis."
Referring to the four boys killed on a beach in Gaza: " their deaths are heartbreaking. The loss their families and neighbors today must be searing. ... The four boys killed yesterday were like boys everywhere, restless for play.
On the broken ceasefire on Tuesday: "A cessation of violence would have offered both sides a chance for peace, but Hamas continued to fire rockets."
Reiterating President Obama's words from earlier today, Power states the US believes there should be a return to the 2012 ceasefire.
"Until a ceasefire is reached, we call on both sides to ensure the protection of civilians."
She called the storing of rockets in a UN school in the Gaza Strip by Hamas, an 'indefensible' tactic.
"The only way to end the situation," is a cessation of Hamas rockets and the deescalation of hostilities.
"Too much innocent blood has been shed. The suffering of innocent civilians must be stopped."
Ron Prosor, Israel's ambassador to the UN speaks now:
"Mr President, for 10 days, the life of 5m Israelis has meant having just seconds to run to a bomb shelter to save their lives."
"Our largest cities are being bombarded on a daily basis. There is no country in the world that would tolerate such an assault on its cities."
"There is no site that is off limits to Hamas." It is storing rockets in homes, schools and set up its headquarters in the basement of a hospital, Prosor says.
"UNRWA 'mysteriously' found 20 rockets in one of its schools." "Hamas is using UN facilities to commit a double war crime", targeting Israelis while hiding behind Palestinians.
Hamas uses Palestinian casualties for propaganda, it perpetuates the killing of its own people, to pressure international community to capitulate to its demands
"There's a clear diff between Israel and Hamas: the jewish people believe in the value of life and Hamas believes in the value of taking lives."
Abbas is president of a unity government that includes a murderous terrorist group. What is it united for? Obviously not for peace.
Referring to Israel being called an occupying force:
"Occupation? Does nobody remember anything?" In 2005, after Israel withdrew from Gaza, there was not a solider, not a settler and not a single Israeli left. We left infrastructure behind to allow Gaza to succeed. "We wanted it to serve as a model for two societies to live side by side in peace. But it didn't."
"In last two weeks, Hamas has fired 1,500 rockets that threaten 5m Israelis, or 70% of our population living in the country."
Prosor takes out a large compass, in the hopes "it will guide the international community" to stand for good against evil, stand for right against wrong.
"We have a duty to our people. To leave no stone unturned ... and attain our inalienable rights. We call on the UNSC to adopt a solution to condemn the Israeli aggression against the Palestinian civilian population in the Gaza Strip." He calls for the lifting of the blockade, and calls for protection of the Palestinian people since "Israel, the occupying power has clearly forfeited its legal obligation to do so.
"I also wish to make an appeal" to the international community to provide aid supplies to the Palestinian people in Gaza, he says. "In this regard, we appeal for urgent donor support to the emergency appeal for Gaza launched by UNRWA on 14 July, recognizing the vital role played by the agency and other UN agencies."
Riyad Mansour, the Palestinian envoy to the UNSC now speaks:
He begins by reading the names of four children killed today in Gaza.
"Despite the broad consensus that there is no military solution to this crisis or to the conflict in is entirety, Israel has increased its operations with full knowledge that civilians will suffer."
The destruction of Palestinian unity is a target of this occupation, he says.
Israel's government cynically used the killing of three Israeli settlers to launch this offensive, he says.
It is not by coincidence that this deliberate destabilization of the situation on the ground diverts international attention from its obstructions of peace efforts, via its malicious settler campaign, he adds.
"Mr President, war crimes, state terrorism and systematic human rights violations are taking place against the Palestinian people."
"This isn't the Palestinian narrative. This is fact."
The PA death toll stands at more than 278, he says. "The overwhelming majority of people killed are civilians including 66 children, 48 women and 17 elderly persons."
"More than 47,000 people have been displaced, most Palestinian refugees."
"These disturbing facts are corrobated by OCHA and UNRWA"
Our children and women and all the victims have names, they are not only numbers.
He reads the names of many civilians killed in Gaza. The names of many are yet to be known, he says.
"The escalation in gaza has been felt elsewhere. Since this morning, restrictions have been placed on Palestinians' access to holy sites in the city of Jerusalem."
"Temporary fixes will no longer do." He calls for the international community to reignite prospects of the two-state solution by intl community. The Secretary General is prepared to do his part. He will leave for the region tomorrow to express solidarity with Israelis and Palestinians," and to try and find a way forward.
Jeffrey Feltman, Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs, speaks first:
"The Secretary General is extremely concerned that this escalation will further increase the already appalling death toll"
"We condemn the indiscriminate rocket fire into Israel which ended the ceasefire. But we are alarmed by Israel's response."
President Abbas has written to the UN Secretary General asking Palestine to be placed under international protection. The Secretary General is considering the proposition
"The UN Relief and Works agency has strongly condemned those responsible for placing approximately 20 rockets in a vacant school in the Gaza strip. The agency has launched a comprehensive investigation into this matter."
As the Secretary General noted, the impact of Gaza crisis is beginning to be felt in region.
Israel's ground offensive has entered its second night. According to the Gaza Ministry of Health, 280 people have died in Gaza with more than 2,200 injured since Operation Protective Edge began. One Israeli soldier has been killed in the ground assault
US president Barack Obama said earlieron Friday the US and its allies are 'concerned' about the risk of escalation. Earlier in the day, Prime Minister Netanyahu spoke with President Obama and thanked him for US support
UN aid agencies have have stepped up emergency aid to Gaza, where the ground assault has worsened preexisting water shortages and sewage contamination. This comes as UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, said the number of displaced Gazans has almost doubled in the past 24 hours
Hamas is facing increasing pressure to accept an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, after Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas met with the French and Italian foreign ministers in Cairo. Abbas also held talks with representatives of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, in a failed attempt to get them to agree to a truce.From Cairo. Later, Abbas flew to Istanbul to meet with Turkish prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
Binyamin Netanyahu has told the Israeli army to prepare for the possibility of a significantly wider ground operation. The Israeli prime minister further justified the decision to go in as Hamas continued to fire on Israel even after Israel accepted an Egyptian cease-fire plan and a UN initiative for a humanitarian lull.
Fatima Ali, a Gaza resident and mother of two speaks about the situation on the ground with the Guardian's Mona Mahmood (@monamood):
The Israeli army's bombardment resumed right away, after the end of the ceasefire yesterday afternoon. ... I had to flee my house in Hay Al-Zaytoon in Gaza with my two little kids last Wednesday at midnight after a cautionary rocket targeted my neighbour's house. I do not know how they can call it cautionary — it is completely destructive. All the windows and doors of my house were shattered by the rocket which hit all of sudden, without any advanced cell phone message ordering residents to evacuate. I hardly had enough time to pick up my two little kids and a scarf to put on my head and run to a house nearby. After three minutes the house was hit by another rocket that obliterated all. Thank God the house was empty, the family deserted the house a day before. They could sense that they would be shelled soon.
Fatima tells Mona that they when she went back to her home, hoping to recover some of her belongings, all she found was a suitcase with some of her family's official documents and an undamaged cupboard filled with her children's things.
We have lost everything and the house can't be used any more. It needs to be built again. But I'm glad that we are still alive, I know families who were buried under the debris of their houses. Literally, there is no safe place in Gaza, the Israeli army are targeting us by all directions.
My eldest daughter who is only 5, has lived two wars so far. I stopped letting her and her younger brother watch TV as all they can see is blood and their fears are mounting. Remarkably, you can not find any human being or a car in the street now, people are hiding in their homes. I can't predict what will happen within few hours. We wish that this war would be over soon, we had enough, all of us are exhausted and need to have some peace.
CNN has removed correspondent Diana Magnay from covering Israel's Gaza offensive, after she tweeted that Israelis who had threatened her before an on-air report and were heard cheering the bombing of Gaza in the background, were "scum", the Huffington Post reports.
After her segment aired on CNN, Magnay tweeted: 'Israelis on hill above Sderot cheer as bombs land on #gaza; threaten to 'destroy our car if I saw a word wrong'. Scum." The tweet was later removed.
"After being threatened and harassed before and during a liveshot, Diana reacted angrily on Twitter," a CNN spokeswomen told the Huffington Post. "She deeply regrets the language used ... She certainly meant no offense to anyone beyond that group, and she and CNN apologize for any offense that may have been taken." Magnay has been reassigned to Moscow.
The incident comes as NBC News is facing growing criticism for removing veteran foreign correspondent Ayman Mohyeldin from Gaza, The Intercept reports. On Tuesday, Mohyeldin personally witnessed the killing by Israel of four Palestinian boys who had been playing football on a Gaza beach.
According to an NBC source upset at his treatment, the executives claimed the decision was motivated by “security concerns” as Israel prepares a ground invasion, a claim repeated to me by an NBC executive. But late yesterday, NBC sent another correspondent, Richard Engel, along with an American producer who has never been to Gaza and speaks no Arabic, into Gaza to cover the ongoing Israeli assault ...
Speaking on Democracy Now!, Glenn Greenwald, author of the Intercept story, said NBC's decision raises real questions, speculating that Mohyeldin's "very mild comments" on social media criticizing the State Department could have been at the root of his removal.
Hamas is facing increasing pressure to accept an immediate ceasefire with Israel, the Guardian's Patrick Kingsley (@PatrickKingsley) writes from Cairo:
Hamas is under increasing pressure from multiple international sources to accept an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, after the French and Italian foreign ministers flew to Cairo – where negotiations have centred – to back Egypt's call for a prompt de-escalation in the conflict.
Before meeting the ministers at Cairo airport, Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, held talks with representatives of Hamas and another Gaza-based group, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, in a failed attempt to get them to agree to a truce. From Cairo, Abbas flew to Istanbul to ask the Turkish prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan – who has better relations with Hamas – to try to persuade the group to accept a ceasefire, said Abbas's envoy to Cairo, Gamal Shobky.
Patrick adds, "Egypt's approach to Gaza needs to satisfy two extremes":
The international community expects Egypt to maintain its historical role in brokering a speedy ceasefire to a conflict, the latest outbreak of which has now killed more than 270 Palestinians – including scores of children – and two Israelis. But parts of Egypt's domestic audience, normally sympathetic to Gaza, want their government to take a tough stance against Hamas, which in some quarters has been conflated with the Gaza Strip itself.
UN aid agencies will step up emergency aid to Gaza, where the Israeli ground assault has worsened preexisting water shortages, water-borne diseases and sewage contamination, Reuters reports:
On Tuesday, UN aid agencies and the International Committee of the Red Cross warned that after years of Gaza's water system deteriorating, damage from the attacks meant the whole coastal strip was facing a water crisis within days.
Only 50% of sewage pumping and waste-water treatment systems are believed to be operational and 900,000 people lack any water supply, Unicef's Chris Tidey said. ... Outbreaks of water-borne diseases are feared in the crowded unhygienic conditions in Gaza's summer heat, agencies said.
Obama: US and allies concerned about risk of escalation
In remarks at the White House, Obama stated he is "hopeful that Israel will continue to approach this process in a way that minimizes civilian casualties."
He said that while he was speaking with Israeli PM Binyamin Netanyahu this morning, sirens went off in Tel Aviv, adding that secretary of state John Kerry is prepared to come to the region. "We are working hard to return to the 2012 ceasefire."
Netanyahu's spokesperson for the Arab media added:
PM Netanyahu spoke with President Obama and thanked him for US support and partnership in developing the Iron Dome anti-missile system.
A man holds his daughters, Shada and Lama al-Ejla, who were injured in an Israeli tank attack, as he leaves al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City. Photograph: MAHMUD HAMS/AFP/Getty Images Photograph: MAHMUD HAMS/AFP/Getty Images
A palestinian girl runs away from exploding tear gas at the Dome of the Rock on the Temple Mount, or El Hareem el Sharif (The Noble Sanctuary) in Jerusalem after Friday prayers when Palestinians protested against Israeli attacks in Gaza. Photograph: MAHFOUZ ABU TURK/EPA Photograph: MAHFOUZ ABU TURK/EPA
At least three Palestinians were killed in renewed Israeli attacks in central and southern Gaza. Medics said two people were killed in Khan Yunis in the south and a third died in central Nusseirat. At the same time, the body of a man killed in shelling earlier in the day in Khan Yunis was recovered. The four deaths brought the death toll on the 11th day of violence to 271, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health, as Israel pressed a ground operation that it launched overnight.
The house of the Antez family in Sha'af looks undamaged from the outside. But the men milling around it have the dazed faces of grief that tell a different story.
Inside, the hole punched by the tank shell that hit the house, after clearing the retaining wall, is visible about 3m (10ft) off the ground.
It seems a small thing – a hole the size of a toaster. But the shell travelled through four walls, scattering pieces of shrapnel that have been gathered and placed to one side.
There were 60 people from three families sheltering inside, some under the stairs, some in a corridor leading to a half-finished room.
Following the shell's path through the house, three pools of blood punctuate where three people died – two of them children.
Salem Antez, 29, approached with a purple plastic bag and opened it, its contents terrible.
"This is my son," he said and nothing else, tears tracking down his face. Mohammad, another family member explained, was two. The other dead were Abed Ali, 24, and Mohammad Ibrahim, 13. Salem bent back to his task – his bag becoming a little heavier. "They hit us at 8.45pm," an uncle said. "We had just finished our Iftar meal and were gathered here for safety."
Israel's military operation in Gaza is being overseen by a tight-knit group of three men, fast becoming known as the "three Bs" – Bibi, Bogie and Benny, writes Harriet Sherwood from Jerusalem.
Bibi is the name by which the Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, is almost universally known. Bogie is the nickname of Moshe Ya'alon, the defence minister, and Benny Gantz is the Israeli military chief of staff. The three are in constant contact to determine strategy, with Netanyahu also regularly convening meetings of his security cabinet – a group smaller than the cabinet, which reviews and decides security matters – to discuss and endorse their decisions.
The axis of three has infuriated some of those excluded, including the hawkish foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, the leader of the hard-right Jewish Home party, Naftali Bennett, and the now-sacked deputy defence minister Danny Danon. They have accused Netanyahu of weakness (Danon went so far as to describe the prime minister as a "leftist") and have pressed for a full-scale Israeli military takeover of Gaza and the annihilation of Hamas.
The criticism from Netanyahu's right flank has been more than merely an irritant for the prime minister in the past 10 days, especially as the Israeli public mood appears markedly more hawkish than during the last conflict. He took swift action in sacking Danon, a member of his own Likud party. "To be forced to sack your defence minister in the middle of a military conflict is a big deal," said one analyst.
French police have banned a pro-Palestinian demonstration in Paris planned for tomorrow. Police said in a statement they could not guarantee a safe march "due to heightened tensions". President Francois Hollande, who is in Niger, said the march would have been a "risk to public order". "We cannot allow the conflict to be imported into France. We cannot have demonstrators (from opposite sides) facing each other down, with a risk to public order," AFP reports.
Last Sunday, several thousands demonstrated in Paris against Israel's attacks in Gaza with violence breaking out at the end of the march. A small group also tried to break into two synagogues.
Izzeldin Abuelaish, whose three daughters were killed by an Israeli shell in January 2009, makes a quixotic plea for Israelis and Palestinians to turn away from fear and hate:
I understand intimately the meaning of unbearable suffering, loss, the absence of security and what it is to live in terror. And I understand and feel the suffering of the Israelis who have lost loved ones and are forced to live in fear. But what is the best way for Palestinians and Israelis to resume hope and life? We need to heal our people and close the wound completely, not in stages or in ways that leave part of it open.
Nothing is impossible but we need to act before it becomes irreversible. Palestinians and Israelis have been angry for a long time but we need to ask what our anger has achieved? It has brought destruction and injustice to ourselves and to others. When the war ends, and I hope it happens soon, all will celebrate the victory but in reality, all are losers from war.
What kind of victory produces orphans or maimed children and wounds to the soul that never heal? As a wounded, bereaved father who lost his three beloved children I feel the suffering of all human beings but I call for an end to this bloodshed.
Israeli soldiers carry their gear as they walk towards a staging area outside the Gaza Strip. Photograph: Ronen Zvulun/Reuters Photograph: RONEN ZVULUN/REUTERS
Members of Palestinian rescue services inspect the rubble of building, destroyed by an Israeli strike. Photograph: Lefteris Pitarakis/AP Photograph: Lefteris Pitarakis/AP
Relatives gather at a hospital morgue around the body of a member of the Abu Tawela family killed overnight by an Israeli strike. Photograph: Lefteris Pitarakis/AP Photograph: Lefteris Pitarakis/AP
Douglas Alexander, Labour’s shadow foreign secretary, has called for an immediate ceasefire and says Israel's incursion is a mistake.
This escalation will result in more loss of life, and in time will recruit more supporters to terrorist groups like Hamas. This is counter-productive when Hamas is already seriously weakened by disputes with Iran over Syria, the destruction of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, and its own misrule in Gaza. We defend Israel's right to defend itself against rocket attacks, but pursuing a doctrine of deterrence which results in hundreds of innocent Palestinians being killed will simply leave Israel more isolated not more secure.
The Guardian's Mona Mahmood (@monamood) has interviewed Nadia Salih, a mother of five and wife of a member of the militant group Islamic Jihad. She described how her in-laws in Rafah were killed:
I told my mother-in-law that we should evacuate our house and theirs soon. It was so obvious that the risk was getting nearer, but my husband was determined to stay with his parents thinking that their home was secure and would not be targeted. It was dawn, my husband had just run to the mosque with his father to pray when his parents' house was obliterated by an Israeli F16. My husband's parents and other four members of the family were killed right away.
By chance, my husband was still in the mosque when the rocket fell, but his father was already back. It was completely heartbreaking to see my husband's family buried under the wreckage of their home. This is not the first time that we are targeted by the Israeli army, my brother-in-law was killed with his young son a few years ago in his car. Another brother lost his legs in an earlier attack.
Though our house was not targeted directly it sustained enormous damage. I could not go to our house to recover what belongings we could use. The neighbours were too alarmed by our presence and told us not to come back till the end of the war even if there was a short ceasefire, they were too anxious that the neighbourhood would be blasted again because of my husband.
Pope Francis has telephoned, Shimon Peres, the Israeli president, and Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, urging them to call for an immediate ceasefire.
"The Holy Father Francis personally telephoned President Shimon Peres and President Mahmoud Abbas to share his very serious concerns regarding the current situation," the Vatican said in a statement.
The Vatican said Francis considered Abbas and Peres to be "men of peace and seekers of peace" and told them the conflict was "giving rise to a serious humanitarian emergency".
Israel said it was reducing its diplomatic presence in Turkey after protesters threw stones at its consulate in Istanbul and draped Palestinian flags on the ambassador's residence in Ankara. This is from Reuters.
The Israeli foreign ministry accused the Turkish authorities of "grossly violating" diplomatic regulations during the demonstrations and said it was ordering the return of diplomats' families and trimming staffing to a minimum.
Turkish riot police fired tear gas and water cannon early on Friday to disperse protesters outside the Israeli mission in Istanbul, but did not intervene in Ankara, where windows of the ambassador's residence were smashed, local media reported.
Police sealed off roads and parks near the Israeli residence in Ankara. In Istanbul, demonstrators chanted, "Murderer Israel, get out of Palestine," and smashed consulate windows with sticks and rocks. Graffiti reading, "Die out murderer Jew," was scrawled on the wall across from the consulate.
Ian Black, Middle East editor, looks at the diplomatic complexities behind ceasefire efforts.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is visiting Turkey on Friday for talks on a ceasefire to try to halt Israel’s ground offensive in the Gaza Strip after meetings on Thursday with the Egyptian President, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi as well as a senior Hamas official in Cairo.
Turkey, a long-time supporter of the Palestinian Islamist movement, is trying to bring its influence to bear to stop the Gaza fighting. Earlier this week the emir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim - another Hamas backer- met President Abdullah Gül and prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Palestinian officials say they want both Qatar and Turkey to use their good offices because of the poor relations between Hamas and the Egyptian government, whose profound hostility to the Muslim Brotherhood extends to Hamas.
Israel’s dislike of Qatar means that it is unlikely to able to broker any kind of ceasefire deal alone: it would only work in tandem with Abbas. But the need for Doha’s involvement was underlined on Thursday when the US secretary of state, John Kerry, contacted both the Egyptian and Qatari foreign ministers.
Hamas is demanding an end to the blockade of Gaza by both Israel and Egypt as well as the release of prisoners held by Israel. Abbas is at loggerheads with Hamas but he must act to try to halt the Israeli onslaught or risk seeing his already threadbare credibility further eroded.
On Thursday Erdogan lashed out at both the UN and Muslim countries for not taking action to stop the Israeli offensive against Gaza, which he said amounted to “systematic genocide.”
An update from Peter Beaumont with details on civilian casualties:
The Palestinian death toll since the start of the conflict exceeded 250, including at least 24 who were killed overnight, according to health officials in Gaza. Israel launched air strikes against more than 100 targets overnight.
Three branches of the Entez family, around 60 people, were sheltering in a house in Zeitoun when it was struck by an artillery shell shortly after 8.45pm. Three of the family were killed – Abed Ali, 24, Mohamed Ibrahim, 13, and Mohamed Salem, two – and four injured. Three of the exterior walls destroyed in the blast.
In the wreckage of the home on Friday morning, Salem Entez, 29, Mohamed Salem's father, approached the Guardian with a plastic bag, which he opened to revealed pieces of flesh he was collecting for burial. "This is my son," he said.
At the Kamal Adwan hospital in Beit Lahiya on Friday morning, three children from the Musallem family were brought in – Mohamed, 15, Wallah, 13 and Ahah, 11. They had been sleeping in the same room in an apartment close to the border when an artillery shell hit. Mohamed and Ahad were killed instantly. Wallah died in the ambulance on its way to the hospital.
"It's very dangerous, there is shelling all the time," ambulance driver Mohamed Zaher told the Guardian. He had made between 40 to 50 trips overnight to collect the dead and injured. "There was so much smoke and shelling. I haven't slept in three days."
Gaza health officials say at least 20 Palestinians have been killed since the ground operation began last night, including three teenage siblings killed by shrapnel from a tank shell attack. The Israeli military said it killed 17 militants in different exchanges of fire, while 13 were captured after surrendering. One Israeli soldier has died. Since the July 8 start of the air campaign, more than 260 Palestinians have been killed and more than 2,000 wounded. In Israel, one civilian died and several were wounded.
Peter Bouckaert of Human Rights Watch says Israel's "knock on roof" warning before a strike is inadequate and includes a video apparently showing the interval:
#IDF#Gaza knock on roof gives residents 1 min 2 evac b4 death hits, not 'adequate precautions' laws of war require https://t.co/Cg5fEsC1HX
AFP has details on the political manoeuvring in Cairo to try and get a ceasefire and why efforts foundered.
A senior official with Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, said the talks, which extended into Thursday night, had stalled over Hamas's insistence on guarantees from Israel before its militants halt their cross-border rocket fire.
Amid the diplomatic flurry in Cairo, Abbas was due to meet French foreign minister Laurent Fabius before heading to Turkey, which has ties with both Hamas and Israel, said the official, Azzam al-Ahmed.
Abbas held talks with Hamas deputy leader Mussa Abu Marzuq in Cairo on Thursday along with Egyptian mediators, Ahmed said.
Abu Marzuq insisted Israel release Palestinian prisoners it had freed but re-arrested and lift its siege of Gaza, Ahmed told AFP.
"Egypt proposed that Israel open the crossings after the ceasefire," Ahmed said. "Hamas wants it now, they don't think the Israelis will respect this later."
Egypt's foreign ministry has condemned the ground incursion but it also lashed out at Hamas, saying the Islamist movement could have saved dozens of lives had it accepted Cairo's proposal.
According to analysts, Sisi, who ousted Egypt's ruling Muslim Brotherhood last year, has sought to corner Hamas, its ally in Gaza, and deny the movement a victory in the conflict with Israel.
But Hamas's rejection of an unconditional ceasefire has forced Cairo to deal with the movement in an effort to defuse the escalating war at its doorstep.
IDF troops have located the shafts of two tunnels, which is the main Israeli mission in Gaza, Israel Radio reports. Troops are seizing control of buildings in Gaza, searching mosques and other sites while keeping guard over themselves.
A young girl is being treated inside the emergency room in Shifa Hospital. Photograph: Daniel van Moll/NurPhoto/Rex Photograph: Daniel van Moll/NurPhoto/REX
Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, said there was a "new quality" to weapons used by Hamas against Israel and that countries coming under attack must be allowed to defend themselves, Reuters reports. "Both sides must accept painful compromises but we stand by the side of Israel when it comes to self-defence," she said at a news conference in Berlin.
The Jerusalem Post has this report on the decision to launch ground operations with more quotes from Netanyahu today. Here are some extracts:
Israel launched its ground operation Thursday night because there is no other way to deal with the labyrinth of tunnels threatening Israel from inside the Gaza Strip, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said Friday.
Netanyahu, speaking at the opening of an emergency cabinet meeting in Tel Aviv, said that “since there is no way to deal with the tunnels only from the air, our soldiers are doing it now from the ground.”
Netanyahu said that there was no guarantee of 100% success, but that everything was being done to get “maximum results.” The meeting was being held in a protected room in the Defense Ministry so it would not be interrupted by possible rocket attacks on Tel Aviv.
Netanyahu said he has directed the army to prepare for the possibility of a significant expansion of the ground operation. He explained that the decision to launch the operation was made after Hamas continued to fire on Israel even after Israel accepted both an Egyptian cease-fire proposal on Tuesday, and a UN initiative for a humanitarian lull in the fighting on Thursday.
“We decided to launch the action after we tried all the other ways, and with an understanding that without this operation the price we will have to pay later would be much higher,” he said.
“The supreme consideration guiding us is to restore security to the civilians and quiet to the state,” he said. “There is not a more moral army than the IDF, and we do not want to harm even one innocent civilian. Not even one. We are operating only against terror targets.”
In this piece on the Foreign Policy website, David Rothkopf highlights the futility of the latest conflict in Gaza and how it damages Israel's image.
Never once have they improved the situation of either side. Neither can damage the other sufficiently to change the balance of power between them. No action that either can muster can be punitive enough to change the behavior of the other.
Nonetheless, both parties to the conflict in Israel and Gaza seem to still be under the delusion that these regularly repeated outbursts actually serve a purpose. Leaders on both sides have lost all sense that when you share a land, you share each other's children, and that they belong not to the flawed nations of today but to the promise of what might come tomorrow.
The sight of dead children not only weakens Israel politically and dents the country's international standing, but it taints every defensible action Israel might take and devalues any future peace by literally having snuffed it out for those who might have benefited from that better future.
An editorial in Haaretz says frustration over Hamas’ rejectionism must not translate into continued mass killings of civilians.
The number of children who have been killed is particularly worrying. Thursday evening, four children were killed in Israeli air strikes on the Gaza Strip – three members of the same family in Gaza City and a 4-year-old girl in Khan Yunis – just one day after the serious incident in which four children were killed when the navy shelled the Gaza coast.
Israel boasts of the fact that in contrast to Hamas, which commits war crimes by firing at a civilian population, it doesn’t deliberately target civilians or children. But the number of people killed to date, as well as the targets of the strikes – some of which are clearly civilian targets – arouse suspicions that in the current operation, the IDF is violating international conventions and the laws of war. The government, the legal system and the military all have a responsibility to put an end to this.
Peter Beaumont has just called from the Kamal Odwan hospital in Beit Lahiya:
"What I am most struck today is that the casualties I am seeing are largely children," he says. He said he had just seen the bodies of three children who had been sleeping in their beds when they were hit. The parents survived. A girl was still alive while being taken in but died on her way to the hospital. They were aged between four and 12. An ambulance driver he spoke to drove out dozens of times last night.
Harriet Sherwood, the Guardian's former Israel correspondent, is back in Jerusalem and has just filed this update. Here's the start of her piece.
Israeli troops and tanks are engaged in fierce fighting in Gaza following the launch of a military ground operation on Thursday night with the initial aim of eliminating Hamas tunnels which could be used to launch attacks on Israel.
Hamas warned Israel of the "dreadful consequences" of the conflict's escalation, while the US urged its close ally to restrict itself to a "precise" operation.
In a night of sustained bombardment as well ground fighting, Israel suffered its first military casualty of the 11-day war. The dead soldier – named as Eitan Barak, 20 – was possibly killed by so-called friendly fire in the north of Gaza. Two others were injured.
The Palestinian death toll since the start of the conflict exceeded 250, including at least 11 who were killed during the night. Israel launched airstrikes against more than 100 targets overnight.
This is Netanyahu's quote from Reuters on the possibility of stepping up Israel's offensive.
"My instructions ... are to prepare for the possibility of significantly widening the ground operation, and the military is preparing accordingly," he told reporters before convening a meeting of cabinet ministers to discuss the operation.
Turkey, which has been trying to mend fences with Israel after the Gaza flotilla raid in 2010, has strongly condemned Israel's ground invasion of Gaza. Using his Twitter account, foreign minister Ahmet Davutoglu said the operation is testing "the conscience of humanity", the Associated Press reports.
Hundreds of protesters, meanwhile, pelted the top Israeli diplomat's residence in Ankara with stones, and the Dogan news agency said police in Istanbul dispersed protesters trying to enter the Israeli Consulate grounds. Turkish legislators leaving a late-night debate in parliament also protested against Israel. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has strongly spoken out against Israel's bombardment of Gaza and said the operations are derailing Turkish and Israeli efforts to mend ties.
Doctors of the World, a medical charity that has been in Gaza since 2002, says Israeli military action is damaging the Palestinian healthcare system and restricting access to humanitarian aid. Health services, it adds, have been seriously damaged by air strikes and have had to endure frequent power cuts
“Most of the cases received are women and children,” says Dr Hosam Abu-Elwan, an emergency physician for Doctors of the World. “Some essential drugs are starting to dry up and no one knows how long our stock will last”.
My colleague Peter Beaumont has just called over a bad line from Gaza. He has just been to a home in the Shaas neighbourhood where a family was sitting down for Iftar when Muslims break their fast at sunset last night.
"A shell went through four walls at 8.45, killing three people, a 24-year-old, a 30-year-old and a two-year old, all males," he said.
The Jerusalem Post has named the first Israeli soldier killed in Israel's ground attack on Gaza. Twenty-year-old Sergeant Eitan Barak from Herzliya died in unclear circumstances, while 14 Palestinians were killed. the paper says.
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