内容摘要：Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed earlier in the week to push ahead with a promised escalation of force in Israel’s war in the Gaza Strip to pursue his aim of destroying the Hamas militant group, which governs Gaza.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed earlier in the week to push ahead with a promised escalation of force in Israel’s war in the Gaza Strip to pursue his aim of destroying the Hamas militant group, which governs Gaza.

, and has been carrying out daily waves of strikes. Ground forces have expanded a buffer zone and encircled the southern city of Rafah, and now controlIsrael has also sealed off Gaza’s 2 million Palestinians from all imports, including food and medicine,

. Aid groups say supplies will soon run out and that thousands of children are malnourished.The overall death toll includes nearly 700 bodies for which the documentation process was recently completed, the ministry said in its latest update. The daily toll includes bodies retrieved from the rubble after earlier strikes.Israeli strikes killed another 23 people after the ministry’s update.

Eight of them, including three children and two women, were killed in a strike on a tent in the southern city of Khan Younis, according to Nasser Hospital. A strike in the central city of Deir al-Balah killed four people, according to Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, and another on a tent there killed four children and a man, the hospital said. A strike hit a coffee shop near the entrance to the Bureij refugee camp in central Gaza, killing at least six people, according to al-Awda and al-Aqsa hospitals.“My son, my son, why did you go out, my son?” one man, Eyad Omar, said in Deir al-Balah as he mourned.

Israeli authorities say the renewed offensive and tightened blockade are aimed at pressuring Hamas to release

that triggered the war. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to continue the war until Hamas is destroyed or disarmed and all the hostages are returned.Netanyahu vowed earlier in the week to escalate pressure on Hamas with the aim of destroying the militant group that has ruled Gaza for nearly two decades. In

the prime minister said Israeli forces were days away from entering Gaza “with great strength to complete the mission.”Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz confirmed Friday that strikes in Gaza earlier in the week targeted the presumed leader of Hamas’ military wing in Gaza, Mohammed Sinwar, although there has been no word on his fate. He is the brother of the slain former leader in Gaza,

— a mastermind of the Oct. 7, 2023, attack.Israeli soldiers work on tanks and APCs at a staging area near the border with the Gaza Strip, in southern Israel, Thursday, May 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)