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An IDF spokesperson said Palestinians should move to ‘humanitarian area’ in Al Mawasi, as Israel’s Army Radio reports evacuations have begun
Hello and welcome to the Guardian’s continuing coverage of the Israel-Gaza war and the wider Middle East crisis.
An IDF spokesperson has issued an “urgent appeal to all residents and displaced people” to evacuate a number of neighbourhoods of Gaza’s southern city of Rafah.
Israeli authorities shut down the local offices of Al Jazeera on Sunday, hours after a government vote to use new laws to close the satellite news network’s operations in the country. Critics called the move a “dark day for the media” and raised new concerns about the attitude to free speech of Benjamin Netanyahu’s hardline government.
Senior Israeli officials ramped up pressure on Hamas on Sunday, saying Israel would refuse any permanent end to hostilities and threatening a new onslaught “in the very near future” if the militant organisation did not accept recently proposed terms for a ceasefire. In a televised address, Benjamin Netanyahu once more rejected Hamas’s demands for a definitive end to the war in Gaza, saying that any permanent ceasefire would allow the group to remain in power and pose a continuing threat to Israel.
Hamas has reiterated its demand for an end to the war in exchange for the freeing of hostages. In their second day of truce talks in Cairo with Egyptian and Qatari mediators, Hamas negotiators maintained their stance that any truce agreement must end the war, Palestinian officials said.
Israel’s defence minister, Yoav Gallant, accused Hamas of showing signs it was not serious about reaching a truce, and said that if this was the case Israel would launch military actions in Rafah and other parts of the Gaza Strip “in the very near future”.
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