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Egypt makes new proposal to restore Gaza truce as Israeli strikes kill 65

Palestinian officials on Sunday put the number of dead from nearly 18 months of conflict at over 50,000, read the report.

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Egypt has floated a new proposal aimed at restoring the Gaza ceasefire deal, security sources told Reuters on Monday, as Palestinian health authorities said Israeli strikes had killed at least 65 people in the enclave in the previous 24 hours, Reuters reported.

The proposal, made last week, follows an escalation in violence after Israel resumed air and ground operations against Hamas militants on March 18, ending a two-month period of relative calm after 15 months of war.

Gaza health officials said Israeli airstrikes and shelling have killed nearly 700 Palestinians since then, including at least 400 women and children.

Among those killed on Monday were two local journalists, Mohammad Mansour and Hussam Shabat, medics said. The Palestinian Journalist Syndicate said at least 206 journalists have been killed by Israeli fire in Gaza since early October 2023, when the conflict erupted. There was no immediate Israeli comment.

Islamist group Hamas said several of its senior political and security officials had also been killed, read the report.

Later on Monday, the Israeli military said it had intercepted a missile launched from Yemen before it crossed into Israel. Warning sirens had sounded in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and other areas. Iran-aligned Houthi forces in Yemen have at times fired missiles at Israel in support of Hamas fighters.

The Egyptian plan calls for Hamas to release five Israeli hostages each week, with Israel implementing the second phase of the ceasefire after the first week, two security sources said.

Hamas is still holding 59 hostages, with 24 thought to be still alive, among the more than 250 it seized in its October 7, 2023 cross-border attack on Israel. Most of the rest have been freed, or their bodies handed over, in negotiated exchanges.

Both the U.S. and Hamas have agreed to the proposal, the security sources said, but Israel has not yet responded, Reuters reported.

A Hamas official did not confirm the proposed offer, but told Reuters that “several proposals are being discussed with the mediators to bridge the gap and to resume negotiations to reach common ground that would pave the way to start the second phase of the agreement”.

The sources said the Egyptian proposal includes a timeline for a full Israeli military withdrawal from Gaza, backed by U.S. guarantees, in exchange for the release of remaining hostages.

Hamas has accused Israel of breaking the terms of the January ceasefire agreement but has said it is willing to negotiate a renewed truce and was studying proposals from U.S. President Donald Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff.

Israel says it resumed its military operations to force Hamas to release the remaining hostages it is holding in Gaza.

On Monday, Hamas released a video it said showed hostages Elkana Bohbot, 35, and Yosef Haim-Ohana, 24, who were both abducted from the Nova music festival site on October 7.

Israel says it does its best to reduce harm to civilians and has questioned the death toll provided by health authorities in the Hamas-run enclave.

Palestinian officials on Sunday put the number of dead from nearly 18 months of conflict at over 50,000, read the report.

Israel launched its offensive in Gaza after Hamas fighters stormed southern Israel on October 7, 2023, killing 1,200 people, mostly civilians, according to Israeli tallies.

In Gaza’s southernmost city Rafah, the municipality said thousands of people were stuck inside the Tel Al-Sultan district where some Israeli military forces had entered, with families trapped among the ruins, with no water, food, or medicine.

The Palestinian Civil Emergency Service said 50,000 residents remained cornered in Rafah, which abuts the border with Egypt.

The Israeli military said troops had encircled Tel Al-Sultan to dismantle “terror infrastructure sites and eliminate terrorists in the area”.

A United Nations spokesperson said on Monday it would reduce its footprint in Gaza after five staff members of its Palestinian relief agency UNRWA were killed in the renewed conflict, but remains committed to providing aid to civilians.

Separately, UNRWA said 124,000 Palestinians have been displaced in Gaza in recent days.

“Families carry what little they have with no shelter, no safety, and nowhere left to go. The Israeli authorities have cut off all aid. Food is scarce and prices are soaring. This is a humanitarian catastrophe. The siege must end,” UNRWA said on X.

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Trump rejects Iran’s response to US peace proposal as ‘unacceptable’

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President Donald Trump’s swift rejection of Iran’s response to a U.S. peace proposal ​sent oil prices surging higher on Monday amid concerns the 10-week-old conflict will drag on, keeping shipping through the Strait of Hormuz paralyzed.

Days ‌after the U.S. floated an offer in the hopes of re-opening negotiations, Iran on Sunday released a response focused on ending the war on all fronts, especially Lebanon, where U.S. ally Israel is fighting Iran-backed Hezbollah militants. Tehran also included a demand for compensation for war damages and emphasized Iranian sovereignty over the Strait of Hormuz, Iranian state TV said, Reuters reported.

It also called on the U.S. to ​end its naval blockade, guarantee no further attacks, lift sanctions and end a U.S. ban on Iranian oil sales, the semi-official Tasnim news agency said.

Within ​hours, Trump dismissed Iran’s proposal with a post on social media.

“I don’t like it — TOTALLY UNACCEPTABLE,” Trump wrote on Truth Social, ⁠without giving further detail.

The U.S. had proposed an end to fighting before starting talks on more contentious issues, including Iran’s nuclear program.

Oil prices jumped $3 a barrel on Monday ​following news of the continued stalemate that leaves the narrow Strait of Hormuz largely closed. Before the war the waterway carried one-fifth of the world’s oil supply and ​has emerged as one of the central pressure points in the war.

Surveys show the war is unpopular with U.S. voters facing sharply higher gasoline prices less than six months before nationwide elections that will determine whether Trump’s Republican party retains control of Congress.

The U.S. has also found little international support, with NATO allies refusing calls to send ships to open the Strait of Hormuz without a ​full peace deal and an internationally mandated mission.

It’s not clear what fresh diplomatic or military steps may be ahead.

Trump is expected to arrive in Beijing on Wednesday. ​With mounting pressure to draw a line under the war and the global energy crisis it has ignited, Iran is among topics Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping are set to ‌discuss.

Trump has ⁠been leaning on China to use its influence to push Tehran to make a deal with Washington.

Addressing whether combat operations against Iran were over, Trump said in remarks aired on Sunday: “They are defeated, but that doesn’t mean they’re done.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the war was not over because there was “more work to be done” to remove enriched uranium from Iran, dismantle enrichment sites and address Iran’s proxies and ballistic missile capabilities.

The best way to remove the enriched uranium would be through diplomacy, Netanyahu ​said in an interview that aired Sunday on ​CBS News’ “60 Minutes.” But he did ⁠not rule out removing it by force.

Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian said in a social media post that Iran would “never bow down to the enemy” and would “defend national interests with strength.”

Despite diplomatic efforts to break a deadlock, the threat to shipping lanes and ​the economies of the region remained high.

Recent days have seen the biggest flare-ups in fighting in and around the strait since ​a ceasefire began.

On Sunday, ⁠the United Arab Emirates said it intercepted two drones coming from Iran, while Qatar condemned a drone attack that hit a cargo ship coming from Abu Dhabi in its waters. Kuwait said its air defences had dealt with hostile drones that entered its airspace.

Clashes have also continued in southern Lebanon between Israel and Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah, despite a ⁠U.S.-brokered ceasefire announced ​on April 16.

An end to hostilities with Iran would not necessarily bring an end to the ​war in Lebanon, Netanyahu said in the “60 Minutes” interview, in which he also said Israeli planners had underestimated Iran’s ability to choke off traffic through the Hormuz Strait.

“It took a while for them to understand ​how big that risk is, which they understand now,” he said.

 

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Fourteen Pakistani police officers killed in KP car bombing and shootout

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The death toll from a suicide attack on a security post in northwest Pakistan rose to 14 police officers, authorities said early Sunday.

A suicide bomber and several gunmen detonated an explosives-laden vehicle near the post in Bannu, a district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, late Saturday, said senior police official Sajjad Khan. The attack triggered an intense shootout, and some officers were killed in the exchange, while others died later after the building collapsed, the Associated Press reported.

Rescuers conducted an hourslong search operation using heavy machinery to retrieve bodies from under the rubble, Khan said, adding that three police officers were wounded in the attack.

Security forces have also launched an operation to track down the perpetrators.

A newly formed militant group, Ittehad-ul-Mujahideen Pakistan, claimed responsibility for the attack.

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UAE countering Iranian air attack after Trump says ceasefire still in effect

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U.S. ally ​the United Arab Emirates said its air defences were engaging missile and drone threats from Iran early on Friday in a further ‌test of the shaky, month-long ceasefire between the U.S. and Iran.

There were few details immediately available about the latest attack on the UAE, which came a day after the U.S. and Iran exchanged fire around the Strait of Hormuz, and as Washington awaited a response from Tehran to its proposal to end the conflict. Iran has often targeted the UAE and other Gulf countries that ​host U.S. bases since the war began on February 28, Reuters reported.

President Donald Trump said on Thursday three U.S. Navy destroyers were attacked as they ​moved through the strait, a conduit for around a fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas flows that Iran has ⁠all but closed since the conflict started.

“Three World Class American Destroyers just transited, very successfully, out of the Strait of Hormuz, under fire. There was no damage ​done to the three Destroyers, but great damage done to the Iranian attackers,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.

Trump later told reporters the ceasefire was still in effect and ​sought to play down the exchange.

“They trifled with us today. We blew them away,” Trump said in Washington.

Iran’s top joint military command accused the U.S. of violating the ceasefire by targeting an Iranian oil tanker and another ship, and of carrying out air attacks on civilian areas on Qeshm Island in the Strait of Hormuz and the nearby coastal areas of Bandar ​Khamir and Sirik on the mainland. The military said it responded by attacking U.S. military vessels east of the strait and south of the port of Chabahar.

A ​spokesperson for Iran’s Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters said the Iranian strikes inflicted “significant damage,” but U.S. Central Command said none of its assets were hit.

Iran’s Press TV later reported that, following ‌several hours ⁠of fire, “the situation on Iranian islands and coastal cities by the Strait of Hormuz is back to normal now.”

The two sides have occasionally exchanged gunfire since the ceasefire took effect on April 7, with Iran hitting targets in Gulf countries including the UAE.

Oil prices rose in early trade in Asia on Friday, with Brent crude jumping above $100 a barrel after the latest clashes between the U.S. and Iran.

TRUMP URGES NEGOTIATED END TO WAR

Trump suggested ongoing talks with Tehran remained on track despite Thursday’s ​hostilities, telling reporters, “We’re negotiating with the ​Iranians.”

Before the latest strikes, the U.S. ⁠had floated a proposal that would formally end the conflict but did not address key U.S. demands that Iran suspend its nuclear work and reopen the strait.

Tehran said it had not yet reached a decision on the emerging plan.

Even so, Trump said Tehran had ​acknowledged his demand that Iran could never get a nuclear weapon, a prohibition he said was spelled out in the ​U.S. proposal.

“There’s zero chance. ⁠And they know that, and they’ve agreed to that. Let’s see if they are willing to sign it,” Trump said.

Asked when any deal might be reached, Trump said, “It might not happen, but it could happen any day. I believe they want to deal more than I do.”

The war has tested Trump’s relationship with his U.S. base of ⁠supporters, after he ​had campaigned against involving the United States in foreign wars and promised to bring down fuel ​prices.

Average U.S. gasoline prices have climbed more than 40% since late February, rising by about $1.20 a gallon to more than $4, according to data from the American Automobile Association, as disruptions to oil shipments ​through the Strait of Hormuz pushed crude oil prices higher.

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