Updates: Israel kills 77 Palestinians, declares it will seize land in Gaza

To find out more about Israel’s expanding ground invasion of Gaza, read this.

For more about the latest talk of military strikes or negotiations over Iran’s nuclear programme, check our article here.

And to follow our coverage of Israel’s war in Gaza, click here.

• At least 77 Palestinians were killed in Israeli strikes across the Gaza Strip, including 22 people in an attack on an UNRWA clinic in northern Gaza’s Jabalia.
• The Israeli military expanded its ground assault on Gaza, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he wants to create a new corridor to separate Rafah from Khan Younis in the south.
• Israeli warplanes bombed several military sites and a research facility in Syria in what reports in Israel said was a warning message to Turkiye.
• The US military launched new air strikes on Yemen, including on Saada in the north, reportedly killing five people on Wednesday.
• The US imposed more sanctions to target Iran’s “shadow banking” system and a network of financial facilitators helping Yemen’s Houthis, including people and firms based in Russia.
• Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkiye condemned Israel for intensifying tensions, including a visit to the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound by National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir.
• An Iranian commander reiterated Tehran will move towards a nuclear bomb if attacked, as Israel held talks with France amid a rare defence cabinet meeting convened by President Emmanuel Macron.

The Syrian Foreign Ministry calls the wave of Israeli attacks an “unjustifiable escalation” that aims to threaten stability in Syria and prolong the suffering of its people.

“The Syrian Arab Republic calls an international community to take a firm position and pressure Israel to end its aggression and adhere to international law,” the ministry said in a statement.

Satellite images analysed by The Associated Press show at least six nuclear-capable B-2 bomber aircraft in the Indian Ocean base, within striking distance of Iran.

“It is highly unusual to see that many at one base abroad,” The AP said in its analysis, pointing out that each aircraft costs approximately $1bn.

The bombers have previously been used by the US in the Kosovo War, Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya. And more recently, Diego Garcia was used as a launch site for B-2 bombers to strike Yemen’s Houthis last year.

The AP noted that the US would need to use B-2 bombers if it wanted to strike Iran’s underground nuclear sites.

The students were demanding accountability from the university’s administration over the arrest of Khalil, a Columbia graduate detained last month for his role in pro-Palestinian protests on campus in New York City.

The students said they wanted the university to reveal the name of a trustee they say reported Khalil to US Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Khalil remains in detention in Louisiana, where he was transferred by immigration officials. Despite being a permanent resident of the US and married to a US citizen, authorities are attempting to deport Khalil from the country, labelling him a threat to US foreign policy goals.

As part of his sweeping global tariffs, US President Donald Trump has announced 17 percent levies on imports from Israel.

Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich had signed an order on Tuesday to scrap all tariffs on American products in hopes of avoiding reciprocal US measures. The US and Israel already have a free trade agreement that exempts many products from tariffs.

Smotrich’s decree still needs approval from the Knesset.

According to government data, the US imported $22.2bn in Israeli goods in 2024; American exports to Israel totalled $14.8bn.

Israel receives billions of dollars in US military aid annually.

Follow our live coverage of the Trump administration here.

The presidency of the Palestinian Authority has rejected Benjamin Netanyahu’s announcement that Israel will create a second Philadelphi Corridor to separate Rafah from Khan Younis in southern Gaza.

It said in a statement that this further indicates Israel’s intentions to “perpetuate its occupation of the Gaza Strip and divide it” in violation of international law, according to the official Wafa news agency.

The PA called on the international community, especially the UN Security Council, to urgently intervene and halt Israeli aggression.

The presidency called on Hamas to “stop its dependence on foreign agendas, prioritise the supreme interests of our people, and respond to the demands of our people in Gaza to lift Hamas’s grip on the Strip”.

The Israeli military has again struck Khan Younis in southern Gaza, killing at least six Palestinians.

A husband and wife and their three children were killed in an Israeli air strike in the al-Manara neighbourhood in Khan Younis, according to the Wafa news agency.

A 35-year-old man was killed and several others wounded as a result of the bombing of a tent sheltering displaced Palestinians west of the city.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has met his Bahraini counterpart Rashid Al Zayani in Washington, DC.

The two top diplomats discussed the two countries’ “shared commitment to safeguarding maritime security and freedom of navigation against Houthi threats, and a shared commitment to peace”, the State Department says.

Bahrain was the only Arab country to join a US-led military coalition against the Houthis late in 2023.

The Yemeni group has been launching attacks against Israel and shipping lanes in the Red Sea in a campaign that the Houthis say aims to pressure for an end to the war on Gaza.

The State Department said Rubio and Al Zayani discussed the 2020 deals that established formal diplomatic relations between Israel and several Arab states, including Bahrain. Notably, the US statement did not mention Gaza.

The meeting came as Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian spoke with Bahraini King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa. Pezeshkian’s office said the two leaders emphasised cooperation between the their countries.

The Qatari Foreign Ministry has denounced in the “strongest terms” the storming of Al-Aqsa Mosque by Israeli Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir as well as the bombing of an UNRWA clinic in Jabalia that has killed at least 22 Palestinians.

“The Ministry of Foreign Affairs emphasizes that the repeated attempts to undermine the religious and historical status of Al-Aqsa Mosque are not only an assault on the Palestinians, but also on millions of Muslims worldwide,” it said in a statement.

Al-Aqsa is Islam’s third-holiest site.

The Israeli prime minister is en route to Hungary despite calls on the central European country and its Prime Minister Viktor Orban to adhere to an arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC).

Following Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and others, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) has become the latest rights organisation to condemn Hungary for welcoming PM Benjamin Netanyahu.

Netanyahu, along with former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, is wanted by the ICC for the war crime of starving Palestinians and several crimes against humanity including the mass killing of civilians.

Hungary is a member of the ICC, but has rejected calls for it to arrest Netanyahu, and there have been suggestions instead that it will leave the international body.

The UN Human Rights Council has adopted a resolution on the human rights situation in occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem, and a commitment to ensuring accountability and justice.

The resolution called for an end to the illegal occupation of Palestinian territory in accordance with the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice (ICJ).

Germany, Ethiopia, Czechia and North Macedonia voted against the resolution, but 27 nations backed it while 16 others, including France and Japan abstained.

The resolution also affirmed the illegal nature of forced displacement of Palestinians by Israel and arbitrary Israeli policies against Palestinian prisoners.

According to the Wafa news agency, the Palestinian delegation present at the council meeting criticised “double standards and a lack of international will for achieving practical steps to hold the occupation accountable”.

The Donald Trump administration has blacklisted several more individuals and entities in a stated effort to impose “maximum pressure” against Iran and the Houthi force in Yemen, where US warplanes have been bombing daily.

The US Treasury emphasised that the new sanctions target a complex “shadow banking” system of clandestine financial facilitators that enable Iran to sell its oil, petrochemicals, and other commodities to circumvent sanctions.

It also said it is targeting a “network of Houthi financial facilitators and procurement operatives” working in coordination with a senior Houthi figure backed by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

The network allegedly “procured tens of millions of dollars’ worth of commodities from Russia, including weapons and sensitive goods, as well as stolen Ukrainian grain” to send to Yemen.

A Hong Kong-based ship manager, a Russia-based Afghan businessman, the general director of three Russia-based companies, and alleged supporters of Houthi trade ventures involving Russia were among those targeted.

An Israeli official has told The Jerusalem Post that recent air strikes in Syria are intended to “convey a message” to Turkiye.

“Do not establish a military base in Syria and do not interfere with Israeli activity in the country’s skies,” the official said of the message.

Israel has struck several sites across Syria, as part of a heavy campaign in recent months, since the overthrow of the regime of former President Bashar al-Assad in December. Israel has also expanded the territory it occupies in Syria, and made efforts to bed in its forces.

Turkiye is a close ally of the new Syrian authorities, and tension has increased between Israel and Turkiye in recent months over the attacks in Syria, as well as Israel’s war on Gaza.

The UN had said on Monday that Israel was responsible for the killing of the medics and aid workers, who were then buried along with ambulances in a mass grave.

“Medical personnel and humanitarian and emergency workers must be protected by all parties to the conflict at all times, as required by international law,” the office of UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said in a statement.

Commenting on Israel’s announcement that it will seize more land in Gaza, a spokesperson for Guterres said: “The Secretary-General also reminds that the Security Council resolution 2735 (2024) rejects any attempt at demographic or territorial change in the Gaza Strip, including any actions that reduce the territory of Gaza. In this regard, he is increasingly concerned about inflammatory rhetoric.”

It appears that Israeli attacks on Syria are continuing.

Alekhbaria TV reports that Israeli artillery is targeting the western Deraa countryside in the south of the country. The same outlet said earlier that 18 Israeli strikes had hit a military airport in Hama.