Israeli strikes hit a crowded evacuation centre in Gaza City and a camp for displaced people in Khan Younis, Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud reports.

    At least four people have been killed and rescue workers are searching for survivors buried under the rubble of a home destroyed by an Israeli strike in northern Gaza’s Beit Lahiya, the Wafa news agency reports.

    People in Gaza are “enduring subhuman conditions” with a third of the population picking through trash to survive in the oppressive summer heat, says the Mercy Corps aid group.

    The United States is “urgently seeking a diplomatic agreement” to end the violent conflict on the Israel-Lebanon border, US Pentagon chief Lloyd Austin says.

    At least 37,658 people have been killed and 86,237 wounded in Israel’s war on Gaza since October 7. The revised death toll in Israel from the Hamas-led attacks stands at 1,139, with dozens of people still held captive in Gaza.

    Israel still targeting shelters in Gaza: human rights monitor

    Israeli forces are demonstrating a “deliberate policy” of “denying stability” to displaced Palestinians by repeatedly bombing and setting fire to UN-run shelters in the Gaza Strip, the Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor has said.

    Euro-Med cited a number of recent attacks on shelters as examples, including:

•     Israeli planes bombed the Abdel Fattah Hammoud school in central Gaza on June 25, killing eight displaced Palestinians.
•     Israeli planes bombed the UNRWA-run “Asmaa C” school in the Shati camp near Gaza City, also on June 25, killing seven displaced Palestinians.
•     Israeli aircraft bombed a school housing thousands of displaced people in the Nuseirat refugee camp on June 6, killing 40 people, including women and children.
•     Israeli forces set fire to shelters in the Jabalia refugee camp during a ground invasion of the city and refugee camp in the north of the Gaza Strip last month.

    “Targeting shelter centres flying the UN flag” shows Israeli forces are “refusing to take any precautions to prevent civilian deaths,” Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor added.

    The group called on countries to end military support and cooperation with Israel and to immediately halt weapons transfers.

    Averting famine in Gaza requires more than food: World Food Programme economist

    WFP chief economist Arif Husain has said the world needs to take action now to avert famine in Gaza where nearly all of the territory’s 2.3 million people face acute hunger.

    Husain referenced the example of Somalia’s massive famine in 2011 where 250,000 people died, the Associated Press (AP) news agency reports.

    “Half of those people died before famine was declared,” Husain told reporters on Tuesday, explaining that averting famine requires more than food – it requires clean water, sanitation, health care and medicine on a sustained basis.

    Husain said the threat of famine in northern Gaza was averted because aid was able to get in, including commercial deliveries.

    But there is now concern in the southern Gaza where Israeli military operations are taking place and the main Rafah crossing from Egypt is closed, he said.

    He said that if the UN and aid organizations have access to places where aid is needed, “we can improve this situation, but if we don’t have access, then it is not possible”.