CAIRO (APThe death toll in the Israel-Hamas war has topped 66,000 Palestinians, Gaza’s Health Ministry said Sunday, a day before Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu heads to the White House for talks with U.S. President Donald Trump on halting Israel’s ongoing offensive in Gaza City.
Mr. Netanyahu has come under heavy international pressure to end the war. Key Western allies have joined a growing list of countries recognizing a Palestinian state over Israeli objections. The European Union is considering sanctions and there are growing moves for a sports and cultural boycott against Israel.
After dozens of delegates poured out of the hall, a defiant Mr. Netanyahu told fellow world leaders Friday at the U.N. General Assembly that his nation “must finish the job” against Hamas in Gaza as his military pressed on with an offensive in Gaza City.
Mr. Trump has so far stood behind Israel. But the U.S. leader has shown signs of impatience lately, particularly after Israel’s bombing of Qatar earlier this month in what appears to have been a failed attempt to kill Hamas’ leadership. In Monday’s White House meeting, Mr. Trump is expected to share a new proposal for ending the war.
Forty-eight hostages are still held captive in Gaza, around 20 of them believed by Israel to be alive, since an attack by Hamas-led militants on Oct. 7, 2023, triggered the war. Ceasefire talks have been stalled since Israel’s widely condemned strike in Doha, Qatar.
Mr. Trump has floated a 21-point proposal for an immediate ceasefire.
The proposal would include the release of all hostages within 48 hours and a gradual withdrawal of Israeli forces from the Palestinian enclave, according to three Arab officials briefed on the plan. The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the ongoing talks, said the proposal is not final and changes are highly likely.
Mr. Trump discussed the proposal with Arab leaders in New York on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly.
A Hamas official said the group was briefed on the plan but has yet to receive an official offer from Egyptian and Qatari mediators. Hamas has said it is ready to “study any proposals positively and responsibly.”
The official said the group had previously said it was willing to release all hostages in return for an end to the war and a complete withdrawal of Israeli forces from the strip.
The U.S. ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, will visit Cairo to meet with Egyptian officials to discuss the ceasefire as well as Egypt’s frayed ties with Israel, according to officials.
The relationship between Israel and Egypt — the first Arab country to establish ties with Israel — has unraveled in recent months over Israel’s attack targeting Hamas leadership in Doha and worries that Palestinians squeezed out of the Gaza Strip could flood into Egypt. Israel has also expressed concern over an Egyptian military buildup in the Sinai Peninsula, a violation of the 1979 peace treaty between the two countries.
Local hospitals in central Gaza said at least 10 people were killed when at least two strikes hit homes in the Nuseirat refugee camp.
Gaza’s Health Ministry said in its daily report the death toll has climbed to 66,005, with a further 168,162 wounded since the war started. Among the dead were 79 who were brought to hospitals in the past 24 hours, it said.
The ministry, part of the Hamas-run administration, does not differentiate between civilians and militants in its toll,
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