LIVE | Day 38: Israeli forces-Hamas fight outside Al-Shifa hospital; civilians trapped inside

The Palestinian Red Crescent rescue service said the Gaza City hospital, Red Crescent-run Al-Quds, is “no longer operational” because it has run out of fuel. Gaza’s sole power plant was forced to shut down a month ago, and Israel has barred any fuel imports, saying Hamas would use them for military purposes.

Nebal Farsakh, a spokesperson for the Red Crescent, said 6,000 people, including displaced families, patients, and staff, remained trapped in the hospital.

Alarm is growing for Gaza hospitals. “Decisive international action is needed now to secure an immediate humanitarian cease-fire and prevent further loss of life" amid attacks on health care, the UN regional directors of the World Health Organization and others said in a statement, adding that more than half of Gaza’s hospitals are closed and the rest are under “massive strain”.

“We do not want to see a firefight in a hospital where innocent people, helpless people, people seeking medical care are caught in the crossfire,” President Joe Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, told ABC’s This Week.

Muhammed Zaqout, director of hospitals in Gaza, said the Health Ministry has been unable to update the death toll since Friday as medics are unable to reach areas hit by Israeli bombardment. “The situation is extremely dire,” he said. “Ambulances are unable to reach people under the rubble.” About 2.3 million Palestinians remain trapped in the besieged territory. (AP)

Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi said Sunday on X, formerly Twitter, that he asked European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell to apply the same “legal, moral grounds” for EU support of Ukraine to “define its stand on Israel's war crimes." The US has pushed for temporary pauses that would allow for wider distribution of badly needed aid to civilians in the besieged territory, where conditions are increasingly dire.

But Israel has only agreed to brief daily periods during which civilians can flee the area of ground combat in northern Gaza and head south on foot along two main roads. Israel continues to strike what it says are militant targets across southern Gaza, often killing women and children.

Dozens of wounded people, including children, were brought to a hospital in Khan Younis after an Israeli airstrike demolished a building in the southern town. Hospital officials said at least 13 were killed.

The war has displaced over two-thirds of Gaza's population, with most fleeing south. Egypt has allowed hundreds of foreign passport holders and medical patients to exit through its Rafah crossing, as well as the entry of some humanitarian aid.

More than 11,000 Palestinians, two-thirds of them women and minors, have been killed since the war began, according to the Health Ministry in Gaza, which does not differentiate between civilian and militant deaths. About 2,700 people have been reported missing and are thought to be trapped or dead under the rubble.

At least 1,200 people have been killed on the Israeli side, mostly civilians killed in the initial Hamas attack. Forty-six Israeli soldiers have been killed in Gaza since the ground offensive began.

About 250,000 Israelis have been forced to evacuate from communities near Gaza, where Palestinian militants are still firing barrages of rockets, and along the northern border with Lebanon. (AP)

Netanyahu has said the responsibility for any harm to civilians lies with Hamas. Israel has long accused the group, which operates in dense residential neighborhoods, of using civilians as human shields.

On Saturday, Netanyahu began to outline Israel's postwar plans for Gaza, which contrast sharply with the vision put forth by the United States.

Netanyahu said Gaza would be demilitarized and that Israel would retain the ability to enter Gaza freely to hunt down militants. He also rejected the idea that the Palestinian Authority, which currently administers parts of the Israeli-occupied West Bank, would at some stage control Gaza. Hamas drove the PA's forces out of Gaza in a week of street battles in 2007.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said the US opposes an Israeli reoccupation of Gaza and envisions a unified Palestinian government in both Gaza and the West Bank as a step toward a Palestinian state. Even before the war, Netanyahu's government was staunchly opposed to Palestinian statehood.

The war threatens to trigger a wider conflict, with Israel and Hezbollah militants in Lebanon frequently trading fire along the border. Hezbollah fired anti-tank missiles into Israel on Sunday, and Israel responded with artillery and fighter jets. Israel's power company said workers repairing lines damaged in previous attacks were wounded, and video footage showed two vehicles on fire. (AP)

The US military conducted airstrikes on two locations in eastern Syria involving Iranian-backed groups, hitting a training location and a weapons facility, according to the Pentagon and US officials.

It marks the third time in a bit more than two weeks that the US has retaliated against the militants for what has been a growing number of attacks on bases housing US troops in Iraq and Syria.

In a statement, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said the strikes targeted sites near Abukama and Mayadin and were used by Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps as well as Iran-backed militias.

“The President has no higher priority than the safety of US personnel, and he directed today's action to make clear that the United States will defend itself, its personnel, and its interests,” Austin said.

A US official said one site also included weapons storage. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss details of a military operation.

The militant groups, many operating under the umbrella of the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, have carried out nearly 50 attacks since October 17 on bases housing US personnel in Iraq and Syria.

That was the day a powerful explosion rocked a Gaza hospital, killing hundreds and triggering protests in a number of Muslim nations. The Israeli military has relentlessly attacked Gaza in retaliation for the devastating Hamas rampage in southern Israel on October 7. And a number of groups have vowed retaliation against the US for backing Israel in the war against Hamas.

According to the Pentagon, about 56 US personnel have been injured in the attacks in Syria and Iraq, but all have returned to duty. Their injuries are a combination of traumatic brain injury and other minor wounds. (AP)

Attacks by Lebanon's Hezbollah group Sunday wounded seven Israeli troops and 10 other people, Israel's military and rescue services said.

The clashes came as skirmishes between the Iran-backed group and Israeli military continue to intensify along the Lebanon-Israel border, threatening to escalate into another front in the Mideast's latest war.

The assault was the most serious incident involving civilians along the Lebanon-Israel border since an Israeli airstrike in south Lebanon on Nov. 5 killed a woman and three children.

The Israeli army's chief spokesman, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, said the Hezbollah attack on Israeli civilians was “very serious.” He said Israel is focused on its war in Gaza but it also remains at a “very high level of preparedness in the north” and ready to take further action.

The Israeli military “has operational plans to change the security status in the north,” he told reporters. “The security status will not remain such that the civilians of the north do not feel safe returning to their homes.” The Israeli military said in a statement that "seven IDF soldiers were lightly injured as a result of the mortar shell launches in the area of Manara in northern Israel earlier today.” Israeli rescue services did not identify the location or provide information about the 10 others wounded by rocket blasts and shrapnel, but said two of them were in critical condition.

The Israeli military said they identified 15 launches from Lebanon over the past hour and their defense systems intercepted four of them. The rest fell into open areas.

Hamas' military wing, meanwhile, claimed responsibility for shelling the northern Haifa and the Israeli border towns of Na'ura and Shlomi from southern Lebanon without giving any further details. (AP)