Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is in Washington to address Congress on Wednesday. He has signaled that a cease-fire deal could be taking shape after nine months of war.
Palestinians displaced by the Israeli military’s latest order to leave parts of the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis say they are sleeping in the streets. The Health Ministry in Gaza says over 39,100 Palestinians have been killed in the war.
On Thursday, officials from Egypt, Israel, the United States and Qatar will meet in Doha with the aim of resuming talks for a proposed three-phase cease-fire to end the war between Israel and Hamas and free the remaining hostages.
Here’s the latest:
JERUSALEM — Israel’s far-right national security minister says Jews are allowed to pray at Jerusalem’s most sensitive holy site, threatening to stoke tensions that are already soaring over the war in Gaza.
Itamar Ben-Gvir has said before it’s his policy that Jews should be able to pray at the hilltop compound known to Jews as the Temple Mount and to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary. But his statement on Wednesday comes at a politically sensitive time, hours before Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to a joint session of Congress in Washington.
Netanyahu’s office quickly released a statement saying nothing had changed in the decades-old arrangement that prohibits Jewish prayer at the site.
“I am the political echelon and the political echelon permits Jewish prayer there,” Ben Gvir said during a conference focused on Jewish access to the compound.
Since Israel captured the site in the 1967 Mideast war, Jews have been allowed to visit but not pray there. Perceived encroachments have set off widespread violence on a number of occasions going back decades.
JERUSALEM — Billionaire Elon Musk in a statement on X says his satellite internet service Starlink is active for a hospital in Gaza, as the besieged territory has faced months of communication issues.
Israel’s Communication Ministry said the service has been in use at the Emirati-run field hospital in Rafah in southern Gaza for the past six months, and they were unclear why Musk mentioned it Wednesday.
During a visit to Israel in November, Musk met with Israel’s Communications Minister Shlomi Karhi and agreed that Starlink would operate in Gaza only with approval from the Israeli government. In February, the ministry announced that Starlink would be available at certain hospitals in Gaza for videoconferencing.
Gaza has experienced frequent communications blackouts as the infrastructure crumbles with months of fighting and a lack of fuel.
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip — The Gaza Health Ministry says the bodies of 55 people killed by Israeli strikes have been brought to local hospitals over the past 24 hours.
Hospitals also received 110 wounded, the ministry said Wednesday. The ministry doesn’t distinguish between civilians and combatants in its count.
The overall Palestinian death toll from the Israel-Hamas war rose to at least 39,145, the ministry said, and another 90,257 have been wounded.
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