Israeli forces ambushed in northern Gaza as Trump, Netanyahu meet

Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu has said that an independent Palestinian state would become a "platform to destroy Israel", in an apparent reiteration of his opposition to a two-state solution.

Speaking in Washington, the Israeli leader alleged that Palestinians already had an independent state in Gaza prior to the 7 October attacks.

Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu has said that he is "getting close to finding several countries" to accept Palestinians as part of a plan to ethnically cleanse the enclave.

Speaking in a joint press conference with US President Donald Trump in Washington, the Israeli leader was responding to questions on whether Trump's Gaza expulsion plan was still on the table.

For his part, Trump said there was "great cooperation" from "surrounding countries".

Eleven Palestinians were killed and others injured on Monday evening when Israeli forces targeted a gathering of civilians in central Gaza's ​​Nuseirat refugee camp, according to the Palestinian News Agency (WAFA).

The Al-Awda Hospital in Nuseirat reported the arrival of the bodies of 11 people, in addition to 72 wounded, as a result of the attacks.

At least 16 Israeli soldiers were killed or wounded in an ambush in Beit Hanoun, northern Gaza, according to Israeli media reports.

Earlier reports said soldiers had suffered burns from the attacks, which targeted an Israeli personnel carrier and a vehicle carrying explosives.

US President Donald Trump voiced his confidence Monday that Hamas was willing to agree a truce with Israel, as he met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

"They want to meet and they want to have that ceasefire," Trump told reporters at the White House when asked if clashes involving Israeli soldiers would derail talks.

Hamas' armed wing, the Izz al-din al-Qassam Brigades, has issued a statement on Telegram on the ambush of Israeli soldiers in northern Gaza.

The group said in its statement that the "funerals and corpses of enemy soldiers will become a regular occurrence, God willing, as long as the [Israeli] occupation's aggression and war against out people continues".

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been briefed on a major ambush of Israeli soldiers in northern Gaza, according to Israeli media reports.

Israeli forces fell into an ambush in northern Gaza's Beit Hanoun, according to Israeli media reports, with at least five soldiers killed and ten wounded.

Palestinian fighters reportedly detonated an explosive device on an armoured troop carried, and later targeted a vehicle loaded with ammunition.

The army's rescue team was also targeted.

Israeli reports indicated chaos at the scene of the attack, where some soldiers remain missing.

Israel's refusal to allow the free and safe entry of humanitarian aid into Gaza remains the main obstacle to progress in the ceasefire talks being held in Qatar, Palestinian sources told Reuters on Monday.

The two sources said mediators hosted one indirect round of ceasefire talks between Hamas and Israeli officials earlier on Monday, and talks were expected to resume in the evening

US President Donald Trump's "utmost priority" is to end the war in Gaza and free captives held by Hamas, the White House said, ahead of a meeting with Israel's ICC fugitive Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday.

Israeli authorities have seized 74 hectares of land in the Palestinian villages of al-Mughayyir and Khirbet Jaba’it, located northeast of Ramallah, in the occupied West Bank.

The area has been declared "state land" to tighten control and expand illegal settlements, the Wafa news agency reported, citing the Colonization and Wall Resistance Commission.

The area includes the Malachei HaShalom outpost, which was built illegally in 2015 on al-Mughayyir’s land. The commission said the move aims to "legalise" and expand this outpost, which Israel’s far-right government pledged to approve two years ago.

Israel's refusal to allow the free and safe entry of humanitarian aid into Gaza remains the main obstacle to progress in the ceasefire talks being held in Qatar, Palestinian sources told Reuters on Monday.

The two sources said mediators hosted one indirect round of ceasefire talks between Palestinian group Hamas and Israeli officials earlier on Monday, and talks were expected to resume in the evening.

Britain has reopened its embassy in Tehran in Iran after a temporary closure, foreign office minister Hamish Falconer told parliament on Monday.

"We have now reopened our embassy in Tehran after a temporary closure. A chargé is in place and we will continue to play our full role to ensure the safety of British nationals in Iran," he told parliament.

The Trump administration has revoked the foreign terrorist organisation designation for Syrian-based Nusra Front, according to memo published online on Monday.

Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS, was previously al-Qaeda’s Syria branch, or Nusra Front. The memo dated 23 June from US Secretary of State Marco Rubio was published in a preview of the Federal Register before official publication on Tuesday.

Syria's foreign ministry had no immediate comment. 

Israel and Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas did not achieve a breakthrough in their latest round of indirect talks on Monday in Doha for a Gaza ceasefire, a Palestinian official told AFP.

"No breakthrough was achieved in the morning negotiation session, but the talks will continue, and Hamas hopes to reach an agreement", the official told AFP of the discussions that aim to bring an end to 21 months of war in the Gaza Strip. Another Palestinian source close to the talks told AFP the negotiations would resume later in the evening.

Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto announced on Monday to send 10,000 tonnes of rice to the Palestine territories, without specifying the region where the delivery will take place.

This move was announced by Indonesian Agriculture Minister Andi Imran Sulaiman at a press conference in Jakarta with his Palestinian counterpart, Rizq Salimiye.

The Indonesian News Agency quoted the Agriculture Minister as saying, "The president has given us instructions to provide 10,000 tons of rice as aid to Palestine."

Sulaiman explained that the rice to be donated is ready, and that they are awaiting approval from the Palestinian embassy to begin distribution. He stated that the governments of Indonesia and Palestine have agreed to cooperate in the field of agriculture.

Yemen's Iran-backed Houthi rebels claimed responsibility on Monday for an attack that damaged a commercial vessel in the Red Sea and forced its crew to abandon ship.

The Houthis "targeted the Magic Seas ship... using two unmanned boats, five ballistic and cruise missiles, and three drones" on Sunday, military spokesman Yahya Saree said in a video statement.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said in an interview released on Monday that Israel, which last month fought a 12-day war with Iran, had attempted to assassinate him.

"They did try, yes. They acted accordingly, but they failed," Pezeshkian told US media figure Tucker Carlson in response to a question on whether he believed Israel had tried to kill him.

"It was not the United States that was behind the attempt on my life. It was Israel. I was in a meeting... they tried to bombard the area in which we were holding that meeting," he said according to a translation of his remarks from Persian, without specifying whether the alleged attempt was during the recent war.

A controversial US-backed aid group proposed building camps called "Humanitarian Transit Areas" inside - and possibly outside - Gaza to house the Palestinian population, according to a proposal reviewed by Reuters, outlining its vision of "replacing Hamas' control over the population in Gaza."

The $2 billion plan, created sometime after 11 February for the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, or GHF, was submitted to the Trump administration and recently discussed in the White House, according to a source familiar with the matter.

The plan, reviewed by Reuters, describes the camps as "large-scale" and "voluntary" places where the Gazan population could "temporarily reside, deradicalise, re-integrate and prepare to relocate if they wish to do so".

A slide deck seen by Reuters goes into granular detail on the "Humanitarian Transit Zones," including how they would be implemented and what they would cost.

It calls for using the sprawling facilities to "gain trust with the local population" and to facilitate US President Donald Trump's "vision for Gaza".

Reuters could not independently determine the status of the plan, who submitted it, or whether it is still under consideration.

The Palestinian Health Ministry says at least 105 bodies and 356 wounded people were brought to hospitals across to Gaza Strip over the past 24 hours, increasing the death toll in the enclave to 57,523.

 The World Bank said on Monday that Syria’s gross domestic product is expected to grow modestly by 1 percent in 2025, following a contraction of 1.5 percent in 2024.

"The easing of sanctions provides some upside potential; however, progress remains limited as frozen assets and restricted access to international banking continue to hinder energy supply, foreign assistance, humanitarian support, and trade and investment," the World Bank said in a statement. 

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) warned on Monday that Gaza’s food system has completely collapsed, as famine becomes more widespread in the enclave.

The ongoing obstruction of humanitarian aid is leading to the avoidable deaths of countless civilians, the agency said.

According to the UN's official website, families in Gaza are forced to risk their lives in search of food, stressing that rates of acute malnutrition have doubled among children, and that infant formula is on the verge of running out.

The 19-member crew of a Greek bulk carrier severely damaged in the Red Sea by repeated attacks, most likely by Houthi militants, are safe and will arrive in Djibouti later on Monday, the ship's operator said.

However, the fate of the Liberian-flagged Magic Seas was unclear, with the vessel at risk of sinking, said Michael Bodouroglou, a representative of its operator Stem Shipping.

Sunday's assault off the southwest coast of Yemen was the first such incident reported in the vital shipping corridor since mid-April. In a raid lasting more than four hours, the Magic Seas was attacked by gunfire and rocket-propelled grenades from skiffs, as well as by sea drones and missiles.

The ship was carrying iron and fertilisers from China to Turkey, and Stem Shipping received no warning of the attack, Bodouroglou told Reuters.

"It struck us like lightning," he said.

US special envoy Thomas Barrack said on Monday that he was "unbelievably satisfied" with the Lebanese government's reply to an American proposal on how to disarm Hezbollah, which had signalled in recent days that it will not give up all its arms.

"What the government gave us was something spectacular in a very short period of time. I'm unbelievably satisfied with the response," Barrack told reporters after meeting Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, without giving details of the response.

Aoun's team gave Barrack a seven-page reply to his 19 June proposal

Lebanon’s Health Ministry says at least 10 people were wounded by Israeli air strikes targeting the country's south on Sunday.

According to the ministry, an Israeli air strike on Rahhal Tower in the Tyre district wounded nine people, while another raid on Zrarieh, in the Sidon District, wounded a child, the National News Agency (NNA) said.

Israel has violated its ceasefire with Lebanon on an almost daily basis since the truce came into effect in November last year.

 A US envoy met Lebanese officials in Beirut on Monday to discuss a proposed plan to disarm Hezbollah, hours after Israel launched new air strikes and a cross-border ground assault.

The Israeli escalation was seen by Lebanese officials and diplomats as an attempt to ratchet up pressure on Hezbollah, whose leader Naim Qassem said in a televised speech on Sunday that the group still needed arms to defend Lebanon from Israel.

The group has been under pressure in recent months both within Lebanon and from Washington to completely relinquish its weapons. It is weighing shrinking its arsenal, sources told Reuters last week, without disarming in full.

US envoy Thomas Barrack's proposal, delivered to Lebanese officials during his last visit on 19 June, would see Hezbollah fully disarmed within four months in exchange for the withdrawal of Israeli troops occupying several posts in south Lebanon and a halt to Israeli air strikes.

Israel's military said on Monday it had apprehended members of an Iran-backed cell in southern Syria, the second such operation it has announced in the past week.

Since the December overthrow of Syria's longtime regime leader Bashar al-Assad, Israel has carried out hundreds of air strikes primarily on military sites and carried out cross-border ground raids.

In a statement, the military said troops "completed an overnight operation to apprehend a cell that was operated by the Iranian Quds Force in the Tel Kudna area of southern Syria."

The Quds Force is the foreign operations arm of Iran's Revolutionary Guards. Israel fought an unprecedented 12-day war against its arch-foe Iran last month.

"For the second time in the past week... troops completed a targeted overnight operation and apprehended several operatives who posed a threat in the area," the statement added.

There was no immediate official Syrian confirmation of the raid.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has arrived in the US ahead of his meeting with US President Trump, Israeli media is reporting.

According to The Times of Israel, the premier was was met by Israel’s ambassador to the US and Israel’s Consul General in New York at Joint Base Andrews outside Washington, D.C.

Netanyahu is due to meet US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and special envoy Steve Witkoff today.

Israeli settlers stormed the courtyards of the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in occupied east Jerusalem under the protection of Israeli police on Monday.

Al-Aqsa has become a regular target of visits by right-wing Israeli politicians and settlers, who have stormed the compound on an almost daily basis, performing religious rituals.

Israeli gunfire has killed at least two Palestinians at an aid distribution point north of Rafah, southern Gaza, and 20 others have been wounded, according to Al Jazeera.

Israeli settlers have reportedly released their livestock onto hay bales belonging to Palestinians in Masafer Yatta, south of Hebron.

Activist Osama Makhamreh told the Palestinian Wafa agency that the hay bales belonged to Ibrahim Ali Awad in Khirbet al-Tuba in Masafer Yatta.

They had destroyed several of the bales last week and released their livestock into them to graze, according to Makhamreh.