Key Points
- The Red Cross is concerned about the humanitarian situation in Gaza, with fuel and other supplies fast running out.
- Hamas took scores of hostages back to Gaza after it launched the deadliest attack on civilians in Israeli history.
- Israel says it won't pause its bombardment of Gaza until all hostages are freed.
Israel's military informed the United Nations late on Thursday that 1.1 million Palestinians in Gaza should relocate to the enclave's south within the next 24 hours, a UN spokesman said, in what Palestinians fear could be a precursor to a planned Israeli ground offensive.
The Israeli military did not immediately provide comment on the warning, which came as Israel amassed tanks near the Gaza border and pounded the Palestinian enclave with air strikes following a .
"The United Nations considers it impossible for such a movement to take place without devastating humanitarian consequences," UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said in a statement.
"The United Nations strongly appeals for any such order, if confirmed, to be rescinded avoiding what could transform what is already a tragedy into a calamitous situation," he said.
Israel says there will be no pause in its siege for aid or evacuations until all its hostages are freed, as the United States urged it to protect civilians and the Red Cross warned of a humanitarian catastrophe in the enclave.
Israeli airstrikes have caused destruction at Jabalia refugee camp in the Gaza Strip. Source: Getty / Mahmud Hams/AFP
Israel has vowed to "annihilate" that rules the Gaza Strip, in retribution for the deadliest attack on civilians in Israeli history, when hundreds of gunmen crossed the barrier and rampaged through towns on Saturday.
The head of the Israeli military, Lieutenant General Herzi Halevi, said lessons would be drawn from the security failures around Gaza that enabled the attack.
"The IDF is responsible for defending the country and its citizens, and Saturday morning, in the area around Gaza, we did not live up to it," he said.
"We will learn, investigate, but now is the time for war."
Public broadcaster Kan said the Israeli death toll had risen to more than 1,300.
Most were civilians gunned down in their homes, on the streets or at a dance party.
Scores of Israeli and foreign hostages were taken back to Gaza; Israel says it has identified 97 of them.
Israel has responded so far by putting Gaza, home to 2.3 million people, under total siege and launching by far the most powerful bombing campaign in the 75-year-old history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, destroying whole neighbourhoods.
The significant escalation is the latest in a long-standing conflict between Hamas and Israel.
Hamas' stated aim is to establish a Palestinian state, while refusing to recognise Israel's right to exist.
Hamas, in its entirety, is designated as a terrorist organisation by countries including Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States.
Some countries list only its military wing as a terrorist group.
Gaza authorities said more than 1,400 Palestinians have been killed and more than 6,000 have been wounded.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said fuel powering emergency generators at hospitals in Gaza could run out within hours.
"Without electricity, hospitals risk turning into morgues," ICRC regional director Fabrizio Carboni said.
"The human misery caused by this escalation is abhorrent, and I implore the sides to reduce the suffering of civilians.
Israeli Energy Minister Israel Katz said there would be no exceptions to the siege without freedom for Israeli hostages.
"No electrical switch will be lifted, no water hydrant will be opened and no fuel truck will enter until the Israeli hostages are returned home. Humanitarian for humanitarian. And nobody should preach us morals," he posted on social media platform X.
Egypt, which has a single border crossing with Gaza, said it was trying to allow in aid there.
In the biggest sign yet of the conflict potentially spilling across borders, Syria said Israeli air strikes had hit the airports in Damascus and Aleppo, putting both out of service.
Standing beside Netanyahu, Blinken said: "You may be strong enough on your own to defend yourself. But as long as America exists, you will never ever have to. We will always be there by your side."
Benjamin Netanyahu said: "Thank you, America, for standing with Israel, today, tomorrow and always."
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken held a joint press conference after a meeting at the Kirya, which houses the Israeli defence ministry, in Tel Aviv. Credit: GPO/CHAIM CHAIM HANDOUT/EPA
"I understand on a personal level the harrowing echoes that Hamas' massacres carry for Israeli Jews, indeed, for Jews everywhere," he said.
"We democracies distinguish ourselves from terrorists by striving for a different standard, even when it's difficult. That's why it's so important to take every possible precaution to avoid harming civilians."
Blinken will visit Jordan on Friday to meet King Abdullah and Mahmoud Abbas, head of the Palestinian Authority that operates limited self-rule in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
Abbas, whose Fatah faction is a longstanding foe of Hamas, condemned violence against civilians on both sides on Thursday.
"We reject the practices of killing civilians or abusing them on both sides because they contravene morals, religion and international law," the official Palestinian news agency Wafa quoted Abbas as saying.
