Israel has a responsibility to protect the lives of innocent people in Gaza, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said yesterday amid a growing outcry over Palestinian civilian deaths.

Gazans searched for loved ones and heard news of family members killed as communications gradually returned to the enclave yesterday after a near total blackout as Israel’s troops and armour pushed into the Hamas-ruled enclave.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said the path to a meeting between President Xi Jinping and Joe Biden was “not smooth”, state media reported as the top diplomat wrapped up a rare visit to Washington.

Sri Lanka has granted 48 hours for a Chinese vessel to conduct marine research off the island’s west coast under supervision, the foreign ministry said yesterday, despite Indian concerns that it could be a spy ship.

Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi yesterday said Israel’s ongoing bombardment of Gaza “may force everyone” to act in the latest warning issued by the Islamic republic since the start of the Israel-Hamas conflict.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Sunday warned the situation in Hamas-ruled Gaza is declining rapidly as he repeated desperate appeals for a ceasefire to end the "nightmare" of bloodshed.

The health ministry in Hamas-ruled Gaza said early Sunday that more than 8,000 had been killed in the Palestinian territory since the start of the war with Israel on October 7.

Israel intensified its attacks on Gaza Sunday, calling for civilians to flee south where it vowed aid would increase, as the Red Cross warned of "intolerable" suffering.

Since the October 7 attack, the health ministry in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip says more than 8,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israel's relentless retaliatory bombardments, half of them children.

Internet connectivity in the Gaza Strip is being restored, the global network monitor Netblocks said Sunday, almost two days after it was cut off during heavy Israeli bombardment

Latest updates about the war between Israel and Hamas

Saudi Arabia’s foreign ministry released a statement yesterday condemning any ground operations by Israeli forces that may threaten the lives of Palestinian civilians.

Kazakhstan said yesterday that 32 people were killed in a fire in yet another deadly accident in a mine owned by ArcelorMittal, with over a dozen still missing, in the Central Asian country’s worst disaster in years.

Israel’s military has told international news organisations Reuters and Agence France Presse that it cannot guarantee the safety of their journalists operating in the Gaza Strip, under Israeli bombardment and siege for almost three weeks.

Gaza was largely cut off from the outside world yesterday as Israel rained more bombs from the air and suggested its long-promised ground offensive in the Palestinian enclave was underway.

A dig in northern Iraq has unearthed a 2,700-year-old alabaster sculpture of the winged Assyrian deity Lamassu, which was found largely intact despite its large dimensions.

Russian forces heavily shelled the centre of the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson yesterday, injuring eight people and destroying or damaging at least 15 buildings, a senior city official said.

Heavy fighting between rebels and the Myanmar military stretched into a second day near the country’s northern border with China, armed groups said yesterday.

Six people were lightly injured when two drones struck an Egyptian Red Sea resort on the border with Israel on Friday, the army said.

The suspect in a mass shooting that killed 18 people in the US state of Maine has been found dead, the state’s governor said Friday, ending a two-day manhunt that mobilized hundreds of law enforcement agents and set jittery residents of the northeastern state on edge.