US makes its first Gaza aid airdrop as mediators to seek truce deal

The United States military carried out its first airdrop of humanitarian aid into Gaza on Saturday, US officials said, and aid agencies warned of a growing humanitarian disaster in the Palestinian enclave as Israel pressed on with its offensive.

Three C-130 planes delivered more than 38,000 meals into a territory where the United Nations says one quarter of the population is one step from famine, and Palestinians posted videos on social media showing boxes of aid being dropped.

A US official told Reuters the airdrops took place over southwestern Gaza and the town of Mawasi.

The White House has said the airdrops will be a sustained effort, and that Israel supports the operation. Critics say airdrops have only a limited impact and it is nearly impossible to ensure supplies do not end up in the hands of militants.

With talks in Egypt set to resume on Sunday, a senior US official said the framework for a deal on a six-week ceasefire was in place, with Israel's agreement, and depended on the militant group Hamas agreeing to release hostages.

"The hostages have to be released," the official told reporters. "The deal is basically there. But I don't want to create expectations one way or the other."

US Vice President Kamala Harris will meet Israeli war cabinet member Benny Gantz at the White House on Monday, a White House official told Reuters.

In Jerusalem, thousands of Israelis marched to demand the release of hostages held by Hamas in Gaza. Protesters, led by families of hostages seized during Hamas' deadly rampage through southern Israel on Oct. 7, arrived at the city at sundown.

RAFAH AIRSTRIKE

In Gaza, the health ministry said at least 11 Palestinians were killed when an Israeli airstrike hit a tent in Rafah, where people are seeking sanctuary from Israel's military offensive.

The ministry said another 50 people were wounded in the strike next to a hospital in the Tel Al-Sultan area of Rafah. One of the dead was a medic at the hospital. The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

"The strike hit one tent, where people took shelter, directly, shrapnel came inside the hospital where me and friends were sitting, we survived by a miracle," a witness told Reuters by phone from the area, declining to be identified.

The Israeli military said its forces killed eight militants in Khan Younis, around 20 militants in the central Gaza Strip and three more in Rimal, near Gaza City.

More than a million Palestinians have been seeking refuge in the Rafah area, fleeing the Israeli offensive which has laid waste to much of Gaza, killing more than 30,000 people, according to the enclave's Hamas-run health authorities.

Israel launched the offensive in response to the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas, in which 1,200 people were killed in Israel and another 253 abducted, according to Israeli tallies.

SEARCH FOR FOOD

US President Joe Biden has said he hopes a ceasefire will be in place by the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, which starts on March 10.

International pressure for a ceasefire has grown, with the United Nations warning that more than 500,000 of Gaza's population of 2.3 million people are one step away from famine.

Three people searching for food in farmland in the northern Gaza Strip area of Beit Hanoun on Saturday were killed by Israeli strikes, residents and medics said. The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Thirteen children have died at the Kamal Adwan hospital in northern Gaza in the last three days from dehydration and malnutrition, according to the Gaza health ministry.

Doctors at the hospital said more were at risk of dying. "When a child is supposed to eat three meals a day and he only eats one, he obviously suffers from malnutrition, and all the diseases that come because of it," said Imad Dardonah.

Plans for the US airdrop were announced by Biden on Friday, a day after the deaths of Palestinians queuing for aid drew renewed attention to the humanitarian catastrophe.

Health authorities in Gaza said 118 people were killed in Thursday's incident, attributing the deaths to Israeli fire and calling it a massacre. Israel disputed those figures and said most victims were trampled or run over.

CEASEFIRE TALKS

Israel and Hamas have been negotiating via mediators including Egypt and Qatar.

Two Egyptian security sources said Israeli and Hamas delegations were expected in Cairo on Sunday to resume indirect talks, but an Israeli report cast doubt on this.

There was no immediate comment from Israel or Hamas.

The Egyptian sources said the parties had agreed on the duration of a Gaza truce, as well as hostage and prisoner releases, adding that the completion of the deal still requires an agreement on the withdrawal of Israeli forces from northern Gaza and a return of its residents.

However, Israel's Ynet news, citing an unnamed senior official, said Israel would not send a delegation to Cairo until it received a full list of hostages who were alive.

At issue was how many hostages would be released from Gaza, and how many Palestinians would be freed by Israel.

A Palestinian official familiar with mediation efforts did not immediately confirm the Cairo talks. "When it comes to ending the war and pulling out forces out of Gaza, gaps remain unbridged," the official said.

During the war, Israel has also stepped up raids in the occupied West Bank, where UN records show that at least 358 people have been killed since Oct. 7.

The official Palestinian news agency WAFA reported on Saturday that Israeli forces shot dead a 16-year-old boy near the city of Ramallah.

The Israeli military said its forces were conducting "routine activity" in the town of Kafr Ni'ma near Ramallah when dozens of people began hurling rocks and explosives at its forces, who responded with live fire, hitting one person.