The attack killed 15 people. “I couldn’t see my two colleagues in the ambulance,” a surviving paramedic told NBC News, “but I heard their final breaths as they died.” Israel says its soldiers shot and killed “terrorists” in a convoy of vehicles advancing in the dark. According to an eyewitness interviewed by NBC News and video recovered from the phone of one of the victims, the ambulance lights were on and the emergency vehicles clearly marked when Israeli soldiers opened fire, killing 15 emergency workers. The footage, provided to NBC News by the Palestinian Red Crescent Society on Saturday, shows a darkened road in southern Gaza bathed in the headlights of a moving vehicle. An ambulance, its emergency lights flashing and marked with the insignia of the medical aid organization, approached another vehicle stranded on the roadside. As the convoy slows down, the windshield where Rifat Radwan, the paramedic shooting the footage, shatters. He exits the vehicle, the camera shaking as he falls to the ground and the screen goes black. Over nearly five minutes, Radwan could be heard repeating a prayer as the gunfire intensifies, before his voice fades and the camera falls still. Radwan’s body was recovered from a shallow mass grave near Rafah, a week after he was killed on March 23, along with his phone that contained this footage, the bodies of the 14 other humanitarian workers killed in the attack, and their crushed ambulances. The video was originally obtained and verified by The New York Times, and shown by the Palestinian Red Crescent Society at a news conference at United Nations headquarters in New York. The organization called for an independent investigation into the killing of health workers, who are protected under international humanitarian law, with the society accusing Israeli forces of committing a war crime. In a statement issued shortly after their bodies were recovered from the mass grave, the Red Crescent Society said the targeting of the medics “can only be considered a war crime punishable under international humanitarian law, which the occupation continues to violate before the eyes of the entire world.” The Israel Defense Forces told NBC News last week that it did not “randomly attack an ambulance,” and that vehicles approaching Israeli soldiers did so without headlights or emergency signals. According to the IDF, it fired on the convoy of ambulances because they were “advancing suspiciously,” and that it had killed a Hamas operative and “eight other terrorists.” In response to the video's release, the IDF said it will investigate "all claims" and review "the documentation circulating about the incident." Munzer Abed, a paramedic with the Palestinian Red Crescent Society, survived the attack. He told NBC News the ambulance lights were on long before the attack started. Abed said the team had received a call about an attack in Rafah’s El-Hashasheen neighborhood, so they readied their ambulance, turning on both “interior and exterior lights,” and made sure their uniforms were visible. “I dropped to the ground,” Abed recalled in an interview with NBC News, describing the moment a round of shooting began. “I couldn’t see my two colleagues in the ambulance, but I heard their final breaths as they died.” Abed said he survived that attack by lying on the floor in the back of his ambulance. Civil defense video provided to NBC News last week showed dead bodies unearthed in a shallow grave. Eight Palestinian medics, six civil defense first responders and a U.N. staff member were among those recovered from the grave. Their deaths brought the total number of aid workers killed in Gaza to 408, according to the U.N. One paramedic, Assad al-Nassasra, remains missing, according to the Palestinian Red Crescent Society. Abed told NBC News that he was detained alongside al-Nassasra the morning after the attack, and that they were blindfolded and cuffed the last time that he was with him. Abed said that he was eventually told to leave, but that al-Nassasra was left in a cell. The IDF did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the whereabouts of al-Nassasra. “We never enter red zones without coordination,” Abed said. “We were in a humanitarian zone.”

Suggesting the findings would be “predetermined,” without providing any evidence, the Israeli prime minister said a court-led probe would be biased. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu railed against his critics and accused the media of working with the “deep state” as he rejected the establishment of a court-appointed inquiry into the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, terror attacks. In a speech at the Knesset, Israel's parliament, Netanyahu, without providing any evidence, suggested the findings would be “predetermined” and told lawmakers it was “important and crucial to investigate in depth the events of Oct. 7 and what led up to it,” but thought a court-led probe would be biased. “What do you think? That we’re children?” he shouted into a microphone as some his fellow politicians jeered and shouted at him during Monday night's debate. Israel’s High Court of Justice ruled in December that Netanyahu’s government should hold a Cabinet hearing on whether to form a state commission of inquiry to investigate the circumstances surrounding the Hamas-led attacks, looking at why the country’s military was unable to prevent the deadly assault. But it has since agreed to requests from the government to delay updates to the court about its stance on the creation of such an inquiry. Lawmakers, including former war Cabinet minister Benny Gantz, have long called for a state commission to be set up. Banging on the podium in the Knesset, Netanyahu acknowledged that the “public demands the truth” about the Hamas attacks and he called for the formation of a commission that would “investigate everything,” including alleged leaks from Cabinet meetings and confidential parliamentary sessions. He went on to blast the media, accusing news outlets of “full cooperation with the deep state” and of creating “scandals.” “The cooperation between the bureaucracy in the deep state and the media didn’t work in the United States, and it won’t work here,” he said, aping the rhetoric of President Donald Trump, who has repeatedly referred to the idea that clandestine networks operate within governments, acting to manipulate or control policy. Netanyahu’s rivals were quick to condemn his comments. Opposition leader Yair Lapid said the events of Oct. 7 would “always belong” to the Israeli prime minister, adding that “there was never a government here that had so many reasons to ask for forgiveness.” Former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said the debate reflected a “total disconnect” by a “disastrous government.” After conducting its own investigation into the deadly attacks, Israel’s military acknowledged last month that it had misjudged Hamas’ intentions and underestimated the militant group’s capabilities and was wholly unprepared for the surprise attack, in which 1,200 people were killed and around 250 taken hostage, according to Israeli officials. More than 48,000 people have been killed in Israel's assault on Gaza since then, according to health officials in the enclave. However, many Israelis believe the failures surrounding the attacks extend beyond the military and Netanyahu has faced calls to take responsibility for his country’s apparent lack of preparedness. At least 65% of Israelis said they believed the most appropriate method to investigate the attacks was a State Commission of Inquiry, according to a recent poll conducted by the Jerusalem-based Viterbi Family Center for Public Opinion and Policy Research. Surveyed between from Jan. 28 to Feb. 2, just 17% of the 604 Jewish and 151 Arab respondents said they supported the idea of a government-appointed commission of inquiry. Netanyahu has nonetheless maintained that he will answer difficult questions, but only after the war that has consumed the Middle East for almost a-year-and-a-half comes to an end. His outburst came amid growing fears over the future of the fragile ceasefire between his government and Hamas, and as Israel faces mounting criticism for halting the entry of aid and goods into the Gaza Strip. Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa'ar doubled down on that decision Tuesday, blaming Hamas for the pause — which came as families across Gaza marked the month of Ramadan — after the militant group refused to accept a proposal to extend the first phase of the ceasefire. The Trump administration has sought to expedite the delivery of $4 billion in military aid to Israel and reverse a partial arms embargo introduced by the Biden administration.

Hungarian officials signaled plans to withdraw from the International Criminal Court shortly after the Israeli prime minister touched down in Budapest. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu touched down in Hungary overnight, stepping out for the first time into a country that recognizes the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court, which issued a warrant for his arrest last year. The possibility of his arrest seemed distant, however, after Hungary's right-wing prime minister, Viktor Orbán, a well-known supporter of Israel, vowed to defy the court's directive shortly after it was issued in November. Video showed Orbán welcoming Netanyahu and his wife, Sara, to the capital, Budapest, on Thursday. Hungarian officials signaled Thursday that the country may withdraw from the ICC, which accused Netanyahu and his former defense minister Yoav Gallant of crimes against humanity in connection with the war in Gaza. As the conflict nears its 18th month, Israel has ramped up its operations in the enclave, and Netanyahu announced Wednesday night that the Israeli military had begun “seizing territory” across the strip. He added that his country plans to establish the “Morag” corridor, which he said would be similar to the Philadelphi security corridor, which cuts across Gaza's southern border with Egypt. “We are now cutting off the Strip and we are increasing the pressure step by step, so that they will give us our hostages,” Netanyahu said in a statement. “And the more they do not give, the more the pressure will increase.” A few hours earlier, his defense minister, Israel Katz, warned that “Operation Might and Sword” would be expanding, with the Israeli military seizing large swaths of the enclave to add to its security zones. Israel launched its assault after the Hamas-led terrorist attacks on Oct. 7, 2023, in which 1,200 people were killed and around 250 others were taken hostage, according to Israeli tallies, marking a major escalation in the decadeslong conflict. More than 50,000 people have died in Israel’s military campaign since then, according to health officials in the enclave, which the militant group has run since 2007. Israel renewed its offensive in Gaza last month, shattering a ceasefire with Hamas that brought relative calm for two months, during which dozens of hostages held by the militant group were released in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners and detainees. Efforts to resume the truce have failed to yield results, with Israel blocking the flow of aid and goods into Gaza for more than a month in the longest aid blockade since the war began. Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and other rights groups have called on Hungary to uphold international law and detain Netanyahu upon his arrival in the country and transfer him to The Hague in the Netherlands, where the ICC is based. Hungary is a member country of the court, but it has never incorporated its terms into the country’s domestic legal code. Shortly after Netanyahu arrived, Orbán’s chief of staff, Gergely Gulyás, told the state news agency MTI that Hungary would look to withdraw from the ICC, according to Reuters. Neither Israel nor the United States recognize the jurisdiction of the world court, which has no staff to enforce its warrants and relies on law enforcement officials in member states to enforce them. Despite close ties between Orbán and Netanyahu, Orbán has been accused of using antisemitic tropes to firm up his support at home. In 2019, a government funded campaign vilified the Hungarian American businessman and philanthropist George Soros, who is Jewish, prompting criticism from the European Union and anti-racism groups. Four years later, a billboard campaign featured the slogan “Let’s not dance to their tune” alongside European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and Soros' son Alex Soros.

Israel Katz didn't clarify how much land his country intends to seize, but the Israeli military has renewed its offensive in the Gaza Strip in recent weeks. Israel’s military “will seize large areas” of the Gaza Strip to expand its security zones, its defense minister said Wednesday as he called for a large-scale evacuation of the Palestinian enclave's population. “Operation ‘Might and Sword’ in Gaza is expanding,” Israel Katz said in a statement. He went on to call on the residents of Gaza to “eliminate Hamas” to ensure the return of the remaining hostages held by the militant group. In a statement later Wednesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described the shift in strategy set to begin “tonight,” saying the Israel Defense Forces is “seizing territory, striking terrorists, destroying infrastructure.” It would also take over a new border area he referred to as the “Morag Axis,” similar to the Philadelphi corridor, to further isolate the enclave. The Israeli military has renewed its offensive in Gaza in recent weeks by expanding in the south and adding a large security area in the Netzarim corridor that cuts through the middle of the strip. Katz’s announcement came after officials at Nasser Hospital in the southern city of Khan Younis told The Associated Press on Wednesday that 17 people had been killed overnight in Israeli airstrikes. The Israel Defense Forces also issued sweeping evacuation orders to residents of Rafah on Monday, directing them to head north to the al-Mawasi tent encampment. The camp was previously designated as a safe zone by the Israeli military, although several strikes hit the area. The Hostages Families Forum Headquarters, a group that represents most of the families of those in Hamas captivity, said it was “horrified” by Katz’s announcement Wednesday, because “military pressure kills living hostages and makes it impossible to recover those who have perished.” “The Israeli government has an obligation to free all 59 hostages from Hamas captivity — to pursue every possible channel to advance a deal for their release,” it said in a statement, which also called on the Trump administration and mediator countries to continue exerting pressure on Hamas. Israel has ramped up its military activity in Gaza since the first phase of a three-part ceasefire deal with Hamas came to an end March 1. Over 42 days, Hamas released 25 living hostages and the bodies of eight in exchange for around 1,800 Palestinian prisoners and detainees, including women and children. Negotiations on the second phase of the deal, designed to establish a permanent ceasefire, have since stalled. Israel subsequently blocked the flow of aid and goods into Gaza while carrying out its military operation and hitting the enclave with regular airstrikes. In the 10 days leading up to Monday, at least 322 children have been killed and 609 injured in the Gaza Strip, the United Nations Children’s Fund said Monday. Their deaths added to a toll which health officials in the Hamas-run enclave say has topped more than 50,000 people since Israel’s military campaign in Gaza after the Hamas-led terrorist attacks Oct. 7, 2023. About 1,200 people were killed and 250 taken hostage that day, according to Israeli tallies. Israel’s monthlong aid blockade which came into effect March 2 is the longest since the war began. The aid group Doctors Without Borders called on Israel to “end this inhumane siege” in a post on X on Wednesday, adding that its teams were dressing wounds without painkillers and treating skin conditions with lotion. Meanwhile, the United Nations’ World Food Programme said Tuesday that all of its 25 bakeries in the Gaza Strip had shut down because of the lack of fuel and flour in the territory. “Hot meals are continuing, but supplies will last two weeks maximum,” the WFP said in a post on X, adding that it would distribute its last food parcels in the next two days. COGAT, the Israeli military agency, refuted this in a post on X on Tuesday, saying that some 25,200 trucks had entered Gaza during the truce and that there was “enough food for a long period of time, if Hamas lets the civilians have it.” But U.N. spokesperson Stephane Dujarric on Tuesday dismissed this claim as “ridiculous,” adding that the “WFP doesn’t close its bakeries for fun.” “If there’s no flour, if there’s no cooking gas, the bakeries cannot open,” she added.

The strike threatens a truce both Israel and Hezbollah have accused each other of violating. An Israeli airstrike killed four people in Beirut early Tuesday, the Lebanese Health Ministry said, rocking an already shaky ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah. The operation marks the latest threat to a fragile four-month truce during which both Israel and Hezbollah have accused each other of violating its terms, and came the day after United Nations officials demanded “answers and justice” over the discovery of the bodies of 15 aid workers found in a mass grave in the Gaza Strip. In a joint statement, the Israel Defense Forces, the Shin Bet — Israel's internal security agency — and its Mossad intelligence agency, said the strike on the southern Beirut suburb and Hezbollah stronghold of Dahiyeh had killed Hassan Ali Badir, who they said was a Hezbollah militant and member of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard who had recently assisted Hamas. Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar told a press briefing Tuesday that Badir was a “ticking bomb” for an attack in the immediate future, adding that Israel expected the Lebanese government to act against any terrorists operating within its territory. While Hezbollah did not confirm whether Badir had been killed, Ibrahim Al-Moussawi, one of the group's members of Lebanon's Parliament, condemned the operation that left seven people injured and said it violated international laws. “What happened was a major aggression that took the situation to a completely new phase,” Al-Moussawi told NBC News. “We hold the international community and the United States responsible for this crime.” Lebanese President Joseph Aoun also criticized the bombardment, saying in a post on X on Tuesday that Israel’s growing aggression in Lebanon had prompted the country to seek support from its international allies. Israel did not issue any evacuation warnings for the area ahead of the strike, while the State Department said in a statement Tuesday that hostilities had resumed “because terrorists launched rockets into Israel from Lebanon,” Reuters reported. Israel and Hezbollah's yearlong conflict was paused in November by a U.S.-brokered ceasefire, which required both Israeli troops and the Iran-backed militant group to vacate southern Lebanon while Lebanese troops were deployed to the area. Both sides have accused each other of violating those terms after Israel delayed its withdrawal in January and said it had intercepted rockets fired from Lebanon in March, for which Hezbollah denies responsibility. The current conflict between Israel and Lebanon erupted after Hezbollah fired rockets into Israel in solidarity with its ally Hamas, following the Hamas-led terrorist attacks of Oct. 7 2023, in which 1,200 people were killed and around 250 others were taken hostage, according to Israeli officials. Since then, Israel’s ongoing military offensive in the Gaza Strip has killed more than 50,000 people, including thousands of children, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry in the enclave run by the militant group. The ministry said Tuesday that Israeli forces had killed 42 people in the past 24 hours, with many victims still trapped under rubble. That figure has continued to climb since Israel's military shattered a two-month-old ceasefire last month, with its assault on the enclave having since intensified with the stated aim of eliminating Hamas to prevent a repeat of the Oct. 7 attacks. On Monday, U.N. officials demanded “answers and justice” from Israel after the bodies of 15 aid workers were found buried in a mass grave in the southern Gaza Strip. The humanitarian workers, who worked for the Red Crescent, Palestinian Civil Defense and the U.N., had been killed and buried in the sand near “wrecked & well-marked vehicles” while trying to save lives, U.N. aid chief Tom Fletcher said in a post on X on Monday. The bodies included eight of the nine aid workers who had gone missing when tending to the injured in Rafah on March 23, with one worker still unaccounted for, the Red Cross and the Palestinian Red Crescent said in a statement Monday. They added that the bodies of six civil defense members and one U.N. employee had also been recovered. Israel’s military has not yet commented on why the bodies were buried beneath the sand or why the vehicles were found crushed. Philippe Lazzarini, head of the U.N. agency for Palestinian Refugees, said the discarded bodies had amounted to "a profound violation of human dignity” in a post on X om Monday. The incident has brought the death toll of aid workers in Gaza to 408, he added.

School President Christopher Eisgruber insists the institution is "combating antisemitism" and will "vigorously defend academic freedom." The Trump administration cut funding to a host of Princeton University research projects, the school said Tuesday, making it the latest Ivy League institution whose federal backing has been reduced or revoked. The university received notifications from the Energy Department, NASA, the Defense Department and other government agencies that funding for several dozen research grants had been suspended, Princeton President Chris Eisgruber said in a statement Tuesday. "The full rationale for this action is not yet clear, but I want to be clear about the principles that will guide our response," he said. In recent funding cuts targeting Ivy League schools Harvard and Columbia, the White House demanded action over allegations of antisemitism that came from last year's student protests against Israel's military action in the Gaza Strip. "Princeton University will comply with the law," Eisgruber said. "We are committed to fighting antisemitism and all forms of discrimination, and we will cooperate with the government in combating antisemitism. Princeton will also vigorously defend academic freedom and the due process rights of this University." Rabbi Gil Steinlauf, a Jewish chaplain at Princeton, said the school was being unfairly targeted. “Princeton’s campus and campus climate and experience is in no way defined by antisemitism,” Steinlauf said Tuesday. "In fact, the experience of Jewish students on Princeton’s campus is one of students who are thriving and empowered and strong,” he said. “And they feel physically safe." Columbia eventually agreed to implement a series of policy changes, including overhauling protest rules and reviewing its Middle Eastern studies department. An Education Department spokesperson declined to comment Tuesday and referred questions to the Energy Department, the Defense Department and NASA. A Defense Department official declined to comment, and representatives for the two other agencies did not immediately respond. College campuses across America erupted in protests a year ago as Israel continued to pound the Gaza Strip in its effort to root out Hamas fighters who carried out the Oct. 7, 2023, assault on Israel. Protests at Columbia might have had the highest profile as demonstrators eventually broke into Hamilton Hall, drawing the response of NYPD officers to clear the scene. The Morningside Heights campus remains largely closed to the public, nearly a year after the protests ended.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reiterated his demand for Hamas to disarm and for its leaders to leave Gaza as he promised to step up pressure. The Israeli military Monday issued sweeping evacuation orders covering most of Rafah, indicating it could soon launch another major ground operation in the southernmost city in the Gaza Strip. The evacuation orders appeared to cover nearly all of the city and nearby areas. The military ordered Palestinians to head to Muwasi, a sprawl of squalid tent camps along the coast. The orders came during Eid al-Fitr, a normally festive Muslim holiday marking the end of the fasting month of Ramadan. The order came after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu repeated a demand on Sunday for Hamas to disarm and for its leaders to leave Gaza as he promised to step up pressure on the group while continuing efforts to return hostages. He said Israel would work to implement U.S. President Donald Trump’s “voluntary emigration plan” for Gaza and said his cabinet had agreed to keep pressuring Hamas, which says it has agreed to a ceasefire proposal from mediators Egypt and Qatar. Senior Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri said Netanyahu’s comments were a recipe for “endless escalation” in the region. Netanyahu rejected assertions that Israel, which has resumed its bombardment of Gaza after a two-month truce and sent troops back into the enclave, was not negotiating, saying “we are conducting it under fire, and therefore it is also effective”. “We see that there are suddenly cracks,” he said in a video statement issued on Sunday. On Saturday, Khalil al-Hayya, the Hamas leader in Gaza, said the group had agreed to a proposal that security sources said included the release of five Israeli hostages each week. But he said laying down its arms as Israel has demanded was a “red line” the group would not cross. On Sunday, the first day of the Muslim Eid al-Fitr holiday, health authorities in Gaza said at least 24 people, including several children, had been killed in Israeli strikes. Nine were killed in a single tent in the southern city of Khan Younis, they said. Later on Sunday, the Palestinian Red Crescent Service said it had finally been able to get access to search for rescue teams that had come under Israeli fire during a rescue mission in western Rafah, a week after the attack. It said it had recovered 13 bodies from the scene, seven of them were Palestinian Red Crescent members, another five were from the Gaza Civil Emergency Service, and another was a United Nations worker. There was no immediate Israeli comment. Since Israel resumed its attacks in Gaza on March 18, hundreds of Palestinians have been killed and tens of thousands have been forced to evacuate areas in northern Gaza where they had returned following the ceasefire agreement in January. Netanyahu said Israel was demanding that Hamas lay down its arms and said its leaders would be allowed to leave Gaza. He gave no detail on how long Israeli troops would remain in the enclave but repeated that Hamas’s military and government capacities must be crushed. “We will ensure general security in the Gaza Strip and enable the implementation of the Trump plan, the voluntary emigration plan,” he said. “That is the plan, we do not hide it, we are ready to discuss it at any time.” Trump originally proposed moving the entire 2.3 million population of Gaza to countries including Egypt and Jordan and developing the Gaza Strip as a U.S.-owned resort. However, no country has agreed to take in the population and Israel has since said that any departures by Palestinians would be voluntary. Israel launched its campaign in Gaza after a devastating Hamas attack on Israeli communities around the Gaza Strip on Oct. 7, 2023, that killed 1,200 people, according to an Israeli tally, and saw 251 abducted as hostages. The Israeli campaign has killed more than 50,000 Palestinians, according to Palestinian health authorities, and devastated much of the coastal enclave, leaving hundreds of thousands of people in tents and makeshift shelters. Sunday’s strikes took place as Palestinians celebrated the Eid holiday marking the end of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan. “We are here to celebrate the rituals of God amid the destruction and the sounds of cannons,” said Minnatallah Al-Far, in Jabalia, in northern Gaza, where most of the area has been laid waste by Israeli bombardment. “In Gaza, our situation is very difficult. Other people are celebrating these rituals in peace and safety, but we do them amid destruction and bombardment,” she said. In Israel, Netanyahu has faced a wave of demonstrations since the military resumed its action in Gaza, with families and supporters of the remaining 59 hostages joining forces with protesters angry at government actions they see as undermining Israeli democracy. On Sunday, he rejected what he described as “empty claims and slogans” and said military pressure was the only thing that had returned hostages.

The details of the proposal weren't immediately available. Hamas has agreed to a ceasefire proposal it received from mediators, the group’s leader in Gaza said Saturday. “Two days ago, we received a proposal from our mediating brothers,” the leader, Khalil al-Hayya, said during a speech. “We dealt with it positively and approved it. We hope that the occupation will not obstruct it and thwart the mediators’ efforts.” While the details of the ceasefire proposal were not immediately available, al-Hayya said Egypt suggested the formation of “a community support committee to manage the Gaza Strip.” “This committee would bear full responsibility for the Strip in all areas,” he said. “It would be composed of independent national figures, and they would assume their duties immediately upon reaching an agreement to block any propaganda that the enemy might practice.” Egypt had not released any comment about the proposed details Saturday, but its State Information Service said Friday that its minister of foreign affairs and emigration spoke with his Turkish counterpart to discuss ceasefire efforts. Israel has submitted a counterproposal to mediators after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “held a series of consultations” on Friday, according to his office, adding that it is “in full coordination with the United States.” On Sunday, Netanyahu’s office issued a statement saying his Cabinet had agreed to “increase the pressure” on Hamas, to “create the best conditions for the release of our hostages.” It also said that Israel was negotiating with Hamas, but that it was conducting negotiations “under fire,” through military pressure. It is not clear what, if any, objections Israel has to the ceasefire proposal. If adopted, this ceasefire would come after Israel broke a previously established ceasefire with Hamas, launching a barrage of deadly airstrikes at Gaza and killing more than 400 people. That ceasefire agreement had gone into effect on Jan. 19. Israel blamed Hamas for the attack, citing the group’s refusal to meet Israel’s demand to release more hostages in return for the resumption of talks. But that was not part of that original ceasefire agreement, which included a first phase, where Hamas released 25 living hostages and the bodies of eight in exchange for around 1,800 Palestinian prisoners and detainees by March 1. The second phase was meant to begin 16 days later and would have included the exchange of all the remaining hostages and the establishment of a permanent ceasefire. The second phase never came. Netanyahu accepted a plan by Steve Witkoff, President Donald Trump’s special envoy to the Middle East, to extend the ceasefire for 50 days to discuss Phase 2, which Hamas rejected. After Hamas’ rejection, Israel blocked the flow of aid and goods into Gaza and eventually hit the enclave with airstrikes on the night of March 18. In remarks following the airstrikes, Netanyahu said that “this is just the beginning.” The strikes ended nearly two months of relative peace between Israel and Hamas. It is not clear how the new ceasefire proposal differs from the last, or whether Hamas will accept Israel’s counterproposal.

“This is Abdullah, 14 years old, and this is Najwa, just 2 years old,” one man said in anguish as he introduced his dead relatives. “The world celebrates the birthdays of its children, and we celebrate their deaths.” No food or supplies have entered Gaza in over three weeks in the longest stretch yet without aid entering the enclave, the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees said Friday, as Israel intensifies its military operations amid the crushing near-complete blockade, plunging the Gaza Strip into deeper desperation. “Critical supplies, including food and medical equipment, are severely depleted and urgently needed to address the already catastrophic humanitarian crisis,” said an UNRWA report published Friday. The World Food Programme said in an operational update Thursday that it only had enough food stocks to last another two weeks, “if supplies are stretched.” “Hundreds of thousands of people in Gaza are again at risk of severe hunger and malnutrition as humanitarian food stocks in the Strip dwindle and borders remain closed to aid,” the WFP said. The UNRWA report noted that on March 18, after Israel broke its ceasefire with Hamas with intense airstrikes, over 180 children were killed in single day, which UNICEF called “one of the largest single-day child death tolls in the last year.” The death toll since the current conflict began on Oct. 7, 2023, has since surpassed 50,000, according to health authorities. On Friday evening, an Israeli missile struck the Awad family home in Al-Zaytoun, east of Gaza City, killing 15 people, including seven women and five children, two of them toddlers. An NBC News team captured the moment Atef Awad, a surviving family member, waited for rescuers to pull the bodies of his loved ones from the rubble. “This is Abdullah, 14 years old, and this is Najwa, just 2 years old,” he said. “The world celebrates the birthdays of its children, and we celebrate their deaths.” The Israel Defense Forces did not immediately respond to a request for comment. While some grieve as their families are pulled from the wreckage, others search hospitals for missing loved ones. Inside Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital in Gaza City, Daoud Awad lifted the shrouds of the dead, searching desperately for the bodies of his loved ones. “Where is my daughter? Where is my son?” he called out, his voice cracking as he searched. Abdullah Al-Majdalawi, a firefighter and rescue worker, described the immense challenges his team faces in retrieving bodies, citing the severe lack of equipment and resources. His story underscores the struggles faced by aid workers in the enclave, who put their lives at risk to help survivors. The Palestine Red Crescent Society reported Saturday that for the seventh consecutive day, the fate of nine emergency medics remains unknown after they were “besieged and targeted by Israeli forces” in Rafah. The PRCS also said Israeli authorities refused to allow rescue teams into the Tel al-Sultan area to search for the missing medics, calling on the international community to pressure Israel to “reveal the fate of the missing teams.” UNRWA also reported that four staffers had been injured by Israeli strikes in March, and that several distribution centers in Gaza had suffered damage. According to the local Health Ministry in Gaza, more than 50,000 people, including thousands of children, have been killed in Israel’s ongoing offensive. Israel has stated its aim is to eliminate Hamas to prevent a repeat of the Oct. 7 attacks, in which 1,200 people were killed and around 250 others were taken hostage, according to Israeli officials. Since breaking the ceasefire, Israel’s rhetoric has become increasingly hostile, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promising increasing military strength in its assault on Gaza, and threatening to take the land. Israel’s aggression aligns with the United States’ more combative stance against Hamas and Gaza, with President Donald Trump threatening “the People of Gaza” earlier in March that if they continued to hold Israeli hostages, “you are DEAD!”

“Leave us Hamas, we want to live freely,” a crowd could be heard chanting at a demonstration in Beit Lahia in northern Gaza on Wednesday. Protests in Gaza calling for an end to the war with Israel and for Hamas' ouster gathered momentum Wednesday, with hundreds of demonstrators for a second day displaying rare dissent against the militant group that has run the Palestinian enclave for nearly two decades. "Leave us Hamas. We want to live freely," a crowd chanted in video captured by NBC News' crew on the ground Wednesday at a rally in eastern Gaza City in the north of the strip. Just over five miles away a similar protest took place in Beit Lahia. The protests began with an initial demonstration Tuesday in Beit Lahia, where protesters chanted anti-Hamas slogans as Palestinians also railed against the resumption of Israel's military offensive in Gaza, which has so far killed hundreds of people. Renewed fighting shattered a ceasefire deal after two months of relative calm. Why now? It was not immediately clear who organized the protests or how many joined them with the intention of rallying against Hamas. But some demonstrators told NBC News' crew that they had reached the limit of their suffering and blamed Hamas for failing to bring an end to the war. More than 50,000 people, including thousands of children, have been killed in Israel’s offensive in Gaza, according to the local Health Ministry in the enclave, which has been run by Hamas since 2007 after Israel ended its 38-year occupation. "We came out to demand that Hamas stop the war and hand the ruling to any merciful body so that God may have mercy upon us," one man, Eyad Gendia, told NBC News at Wednesday's protest in the Shujaiya neighborhood of eastern Gaza City. "The impact of the war is that we are sleeping in the streets ... We have lost all of our children," he said. Before this week, NBC News had documented smaller anti-war protests in Gaza but this week's demonstrations represent the biggest since the conflict began after Hamas led terrorist attacks in Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, in which some 1,200 people were killed and around 250 others taken hostage, according to Israeli officials. Israel, which continues to block the entry of aid and goods into the Gaza Strip, has said it wants to eliminate Hamas to ensure that the Oct. 7 attacks will not be repeated. The United States has supported Israel in its campaign, with President Donald Trump also sparking widespread condemnation by suggesting that America take over the enclave and turn it into the "Riviera of the Middle East." "If the Israel problem is Hamas, we will expel Hamas to resolve this issue," said another man, who did not share his name. "We are demanding an end to the frantic war against Gaza's children, women and elderly." "We need a permanent ceasefire," said a third demonstrator, who spoke without offering identification. The Israeli Foreign Ministry said in a post on X on Wednesday that the anti-Hamas slogans shouted at the protests were proof that "Hamas' refusal to release the hostages" was "fueling war and the suffering of the people of Gaza." Basem Naim, a senior political official for Hamas, told NBC News on Wednesday that "everyone has the right to scream in pain and to raise their voice against the aggression towards our people," but he said it was "unacceptable to exploit these tragic humanitarian situations for questionable political agendas or to shift blame away from the real aggressors." Mounting pressure Hamas' popularity in Gaza is hard to gauge, due to fears over speaking out and the difficulties of conducting polling during a war. But a poll released in September by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research, a think tank based in the occupied West Bank, found support for Hamas in the Gaza Strip to be at 35%, compared to 38% three months before. Sanam Vakil, director of the London-based think tank Chatham House’s Middle East and North Africa program, said the protests put fresh pressure on Hamas as Israel and the U.S. push the militant group to agree to an extension of the first phase of the ceasefire deal, which expired March 1, and to release more hostages. Hamas has refused, instead demanding a return to negotiations aimed at launching the second phase of the deal, as had been planned under the framework of the truce deal. The second phase was meant to pave the way to an end to the war, although the truce disintegrated when Israeli forces resumed airstrikes on Gaza. "The big questions for Hamas are really, how it can be a resilient political force in the climate of so much pressure?" Vakil said in a phone interview Wednesday. Hamas has previously signaled it would be willing to cede political power and administrative governance of Gaza to a Palestinian unity government, but said it would be unwilling to disarm until internationally recognized independent Palestinian statehood is achieved.