CAIRO, June 29 — The Israeli military has ordered Palestinians to evacuate areas in northern Gaza on Sunday before intensified fighting against Hamas, as United States (US) President Donald Trump called for an end to the war amid renewed efforts to broker a ceasefire.
"Make the deal in Gaza, get the hostages back," he posted on his Truth Social platform early on Sunday.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was due to hold talks later in the day on the progress of Israel's offensive. A senior security official said the military will tell him the campaign is close to reaching its objectives, and warn that expanding fighting to new areas in Gaza may endanger the remaining Israeli hostages.
But in a statement posted on X (formerly Twitter) and text messages sent to many residents, the military urged people in northern parts of the enclave to head south towards the Al-Mawasi area in Khan Younis, which Israel designated as a humanitarian area. Palestinian and United Nations officials say that nowhere in Gaza is safe.
"The (Israeli) Defence Forces is operating with extreme force in these areas, and these military operations will escalate, intensify, and extend westward to the city centre to destroy the capabilities of terrorist organisations," the military said.
The evacuation order covered the Jabalia area and most Gaza City districts. Medics and residents said the Israeli army's bombardments escalated in the early hours in Jabalia, destroying several houses and killing at least six people.
In Khan Younis in the south, five people were killed in an airstrike on a tent encampment near Mawasi, medics said.
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A Palestinian injured in an overnight Israeli strike on a tent, bids farewell to his brother, who was killed in the same strike, at the Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, Palestine, on June 29, 2025. — Picture by REUTERS[/caption]
New ceasefire push
The escalation comes as Arab mediators, Egypt and Qatar, backed by the US, begin a new ceasefire effort to halt the 20-month-old conflict and secure the release of Israeli and foreign hostages still being held by Hamas.
Interest in resolving the Gaza conflict has heightened in the wake of US and Israeli bombings of Iran's nuclear facilities.
A Hamas official told Reuters that the group had informed the mediators it was ready to resume ceasefire talks, but reaffirmed the group's outstanding demands that any deal must end the war and secure an Israeli withdrawal from the coastal territory.
Hamas has said it is willing to free remaining hostages in Gaza, 20 of whom are believed to still be alive, only in a deal that will end the war. Israel says it can only end it if Hamas is disarmed and dismantled. Hamas refuses to lay down its arms.
The latest bloodshed in the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict was triggered in October 2023 when Hamas attacked Israel, killing 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages, Israeli tallies show.
Israel's subsequent military assault has killed over 56,000 Palestinians, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, displaced almost the entire 2.3 million population, plunged the enclave into a humanitarian crisis and left much of it in ruins.
— Reuters
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Mourners react during the funeral of Palestinians killed in an overnight Israeli strike on a tent at the Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, Palestine, on June 29, 2025. — Picture by REUTERS[/caption]
