Israel’s war on Gaza updates: 83 killed in unrelenting Israeli attacks

In addition, the French president has called for the release of captives in the coastal enclave, humanitarian aid and a two-state solution.

“There is no alternative for lasting peace,” he asserted in a post on X, together with a photo of him in a meeting with “members of the Arab League and Organization of Islamic Cooperation”.

US citizen and former Columbia law school professor Sarah Cleveland was among the 13 ICJ judges who voted in favour of today’s order calling for the immediate halt of Israel’s offensive in Rafah.

Her position underscores the unique predicament for the Biden administration in the wake of the recent decision. Unlike at the International Criminal Court (ICC), to which the US has kept an arms distance, Washington has been far more supportive of the ICJ.

While Cleveland campaigned independently for the post 2023, US top diplomat Antony Blinken praised her election to the court.

“The United States values the critical work of the ICJ as the principal judicial organ of the United Nations,” Blinken said at the time.

“The Court’s contributions to the peaceful settlement of disputes and its work as a guardian of international law has never been more important.”

In 2021, Biden nominated Cleveland to be a legal advisor to the State Department, but she was never confirmed. The Biden administration has not yet responded to the ICJ’s latest decision.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has said the rulings of the International Court of Justice are “binding” after it ordered Israel to halt military operations in southern Gaza.

“The Secretary General recalls that … decisions of the International Court of Justice are binding, and he trusts that the parties will duly comply with the order from the court,” his spokesman Stephane Dujarric told the reporters.

Guterres will also properly transmit the notice of provisional measures ordered by the Court to the Security Council, Dujarric added.

“Whether or not the decisions of the court are implemented or not implemented, what is next for us is continuing every effort to deliver more humanitarian aid to the people in Gaza,” he noted.

Israel’s prime minister has banned Israel’s intelligence and security chiefs from meeting with US officials and lawmakers several times since October 7, Axios reports.

“Netanyahu seems to be trying to control what American politicians and diplomats hear from Israel, at a time when his government is deeply divided over his war strategy, and relations with the US are growing more tense”, US officials told Axios.

“Netanyahu’s most recent push to control the messaging about the war came three weeks ago, when he banned the directors of the Mossad and Shin Bet intelligence and security agencies from meeting with Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), the US officials said.”

Thank you for joining us for real-time updates on everything related to Israel’s war on Gaza.

For more on the UN’s announcement that nearly 800,000 people have now fled Rafah, read here.

Read more about Israeli war cabinet member Benny Gantz’s six-point plan for the future of Gaza here.

And for more news, analysis and opinion on the conflict, click here.

We will be closing this live page soon. Here are the latest news lines:

• UNRWA’s chief says 800,000 people in southern Rafah have been forced to flee since Israeli forces began their ground assault on May 6.
• At least 28 Palestinians – mostly women and children – were killed by an air attack near Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza.
• UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres says the war on Gaza “is an open wound that threatens to infect the entire region”.
• Israeli war cabinet minister Benny Gantz has threatened to withdraw his centrist party if the Netanyahu-led government fails to come up with a post-war plan for Gaza by June 8.
• Israel’s military orders the immediate evacuation of additional neighbourhoods in northern Gaza, raising new fears of deadly incursions.

Iran’s permanent mission to the UN in New York confirmed reports that Iranian officials held indirect talks with US counterparts in Oman this week.

It described the situation as “an ongoing process”, and said negotiations were not the first and wouldn’t be the last, according to state-run IRNA news website.

The US outlet Axios earlier cited unnamed sources as saying the US was represented by Biden’s top Middle East adviser, Brett McGurk, along with the acting US envoy for Iran, Abram Paley. The negotiations aimed to reduce tensions in the region and discuss Iran’s nuclear programme.

It was reportedly the first round of indirect talks held in Oman since January and comes a month since the region was on the verge of an all-out war after Iran launched hundreds of projectiles at Israel following Israel’s levelling of Tehran’s consulate in Syria, in which two generals were killed.

The children were arrested during an Israeli raid on Kafr Malek, a village east of Ramallah, Wafa reports.

The children were identified as Ahmed Jihad Ghanimat, 15, and Amjad Jihad Sari, 14.

Israeli incursions into the occupied West Bank have intensified since the war on Gaza started on October 7. More than 8,000 Palestinians have been arrested over the past seven months.

The armed Lebanese group says in its end-of-day report that it conducted “12 successful attacks” on Israeli positions.

The latest came in the late afternoon, targeting a military position in northern Israel with artillery shells, with another hitting newly installed “spy equipment” at an army barracks.

Hezbollah also launched rocket attacks and sent drones into northern Israel – which the Israeli military earlier said inflicted no casualties.

The videos below shows large numbers of protesters shouting “Free, free Palestine” and “Down with the occupation” in the streets of Dusseldorf in western Germany.

In Italy’s Milan, demonstrators waved Palestinian flags and shouted slogans against the war on Gaza.

Translation: A massive demonstration in the German city of Dusseldorf in support of the Gaza Strip in the face of Israeli aggression.

Translation: A massive demonstration in the Italian city of Milan in support of Palestine and in support of the Gaza Strip in the face of Israeli aggression.

The Israeli military says its latest ground invasion of Jabalia, in northern Gaza, is intensifying with its paratroopers brigade pushing towards neighbourhoods where they have not fought before.

Soldiers engaged in dozens of firefights with armed Palestinians, some of whom were killed, with troops finding weapons and explosive devices, it said.

It released a video showing two Palestinian fighters being gunned down on the rooftop of a building after a gun battle started inside. The first Palestinian is shot dead with the second immediately picking up his weapon and shooting before being killed.

The Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor says the closure of the Rafah land crossing – after its seizure by the Israeli military – has killed many wounded or sick Palestinians.

“The closure of the Rafah crossing has made it impossible for more than 11,000 wounded people to get the urgent medical care they need outside the Gaza Strip, while over 10,000 cancer patients and at least 2,000 patients with other diseases – of whom about 750 are children – require treatment outside the Gaza Strip,” said the Geneva-based human rights organisation.

“Fewer than 4,000 cancer patients have been granted permission to leave Gaza to receive treatment abroad since October 2023, according to officials at the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza and medical relief organisations.

“However, in practice, only about 600 patients have done so and the remaining patients currently face an uncertain future due to the closure of the Rafah crossing, knowing that the majority of cancer treatments are not available inside Gaza.”

About 400 pro-Palestine supporters rallied on the National Mall. There were calls in support of Palestinian rights and an immediate end to Israeli military operations in Gaza.

“No peace on stolen land” and “End the killings, stop the crime/Israel out of Palestine” echoed through the crowd.

Protesters also focused their anger on US President Biden, whom they accused of feigning concern over the death toll in Gaza.

“Biden Biden, you will see, genocide’s your legacy,” they said.

Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz released a video of the October 7 attacks showing the body of Shani Louk – believed killed while fleeing the Supernova music festival – being transported on the back of a truck to Gaza.

“These are your Hamas partners whom you call ‘freedom fighters’,” he said, noting Louk’s body was recovered from Gaza on Friday. “You should be silent and ashamed.”.

The Turkish Foreign Ministry presented a response to Katz and Israel – “accused of genocide” – by publishing photos of children killed in Gaza, mass graves found at hospitals and medical workers holding a news conference among bodies of Palestinians killed by Israel.

Israel says it will end its trade agreements with Turkey after Ankara halted Israeli imports and exports until a ceasefire is achieved in Gaza and aid is delivered to Palestinians.

Translation: Our response to Foreign Minister Katz, the spokesperson of the Israeli Government, who is accused of genocide:

Al Jazeera is reporting from Jordan because Israel’s government banned the network from Israel.

It’s of note [that] Yair Lapid, the opposition leader in Israel, attended the demonstration in Tel Aviv this evening. He had also called on Benny Gantz to resign from the war cabinet if Prime Minister Netanyahu [didn’t] start doing more to secure the release of captives being held in Gaza.

Beyond that, you have these demonstrations gathering momentum. I was at one just two weeks ago in Tel Aviv – when we could still report out of Israel. I saw thousands of people coming out.

Antigovernment demonstrators are calling on Netanyahu to resign, saying he’s trying to prolong the war so he can stay in office longer. However, Netanyahu is feeling the most amount of pressure from the far-right flank of his governing coalition.

I’m talking about far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, who have for months now said [that] if Netanyahu doesn’t go full force into Rafah, they will walk away from the government.

A senior Fatah official says the US announcement that the newly built pier is now functional, “in light of Israel’s control over Rafah on the Palestinian side, strengthens the occupation and isolates the coastal enclave completely”.

Abdel Fatah Doleh, a Fatah spokesman, said this move also “allows Israel to continue its attack on Rafah, and to completely control the enclave”.

Doleh said efforts should be made to reach a ceasefire, stop the war permanently and allow aid to go through all the land crossings, “which is something the US is capable of doing but instead, it is giving Netanyahu free rein to allow his army to carry out massacres against Palestinians”.

The Israeli military says it is “increasing” humanitarian aid to Gaza even as the UN and the international community decry the lacklustre efforts as intense fighting rages across the enclave.

More than 1,050 humanitarian aid trucks entered Gaza through the new “Western Erez” and the Karem Abu Salem (Kerem Shalom) crossings.

Meanwhile, 160,000 litres (26,417 gallons) of fuel and other goods came in through the US-built floating pier, it said.

The military also claimed that flour from 204 World Food Programme trucks and 120 Jordanian aid trucks was delivered inside Gaza.

Amid its ground invasion in eastern Rafah, the Israeli military has closed the Rafah land crossing, along with multiple others.