Palestinians in Rafah told AFP they were living in “constant terror” as Israel vows to push ahead with its planned assault on the south Gaza city flooded with displaced civilians.

Diplomatic efforts increased yesterday to reach a long sought-after truce and hostage-release deal in Gaza, as Israel carried out further air strikes and shelling on the Palestinian territory.

Hamas said it was studying the latest Israeli counterproposal regarding a potential ceasefire in Gaza yesterday, a day after media reports said a delegation from mediator Egypt arrived in Israel in a bid to jump-start stalled negotiations.

An Egyptian delegation met Israeli officials yesterday, looking for a way to restart talks to end the offensive in Gaza and return the remaining Israeli hostages, an official briefed on the meetings said.

Israel stepped up airstrikes on Rafah after saying it would evacuate civilians from the southern Gazan city and launch an all-out assault despite allies’ warnings this could cause mass casualties.

US-led coalition forces shot down four drones and an anti-ship missile launched by Yemen’s Houthi rebels, American authorities said yesterday, as the Iran-backed group announced strikes against US and Israeli ships.

Palestinian woman Reem Zidan had been searching for her son for months, and finally found his body on Wednesday as a bulldozer unearthed human remains outside a Gaza hospital.

Some Palestinian civilians were fleeing their homes in northern Gaza yesterday just weeks after returning because of an Israeli bombardment which they said was as intense as at the start of the offensive.

Iran has reduced its military footprint in Syria after a succession of strikes blamed on Israel, a source close to Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah and a war monitor said yesterday.

Protests against Israel filled streets in Brooklyn and escalated at universities across the United States, some of which included Jewish Passover Seders, as demonstrators demanded an end to civilian casualties in Gaza.

The Israeli army said yesterday it struck 40 Hezbollah targets in southern Lebanon as near-daily exchanges of fire rage on the border between the two countries.

The Gaza Strip could surpass famine thresholds of food insecurity, malnutrition and mortality in six weeks, an official from the World Food Programme said yesterday.

UN rights chief Volker Turk said yesterday that he was "horrified" by the destruction of the Nasser and Al Shifa hospitals in Gaza and reports of mass graves containing hundreds of bodies there, according to a spokesperson.

Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah group said yesterday it had launched a drone attack against Israeli military bases north of the city of Acre, in its deepest strike into Israeli territory since the Gaza offensive began.

Tensions flared between pro-Palestinian student protesters and school administrators at several US universities Monday, as in-person classes were cancelled and demonstrators arrested.

Gaza was hit by heavy Israeli shelling yesterday, with strikes reported in several areas in the centre and south of the besieged territory, as Prime Minister Netanyahu vowed “painful blows” on Hamas to free hostages.

Egypt welcomed home a 3,400-year-old statue depicting the head of King Ramses II after it was stolen and smuggled out of the country more than three decades ago, the country’s antiquities ministry said on Sunday.

US forces in Iraq and Syria faced two separate rocket and explosive drone attacks in less than 24 hours, Iraqi security sources and US officials told Reuters yesterday, the first reported after a near three-month pause.

Iran-backed Lebanese group Hezbollah said on Sunday it downed an Israeli drone that was on a combat mission in southern Lebanon.

Israel carried out deadly strikes in Gaza’s southernmost city of Rafah, first responders in the Palestinian territory said yesterday, as violence flared in the occupied West Bank.