Israeli forces killed at least 53 people in Gaza and 21 people in Lebanon on Sunday as UN chief Antonio Guterres expressed shock at the “harrowing levels of death, injury and destruction” in besieged northern Gaza.

    Egypt has proposed a limited two-day ceasefire in Gaza to exchange four Israelis for Palestinian prisoners as negotiations to end the yearlong war resumed in Qatar’s capital, Doha.

    Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian said Tehran was not looking for war, but would give an “appropriate response” to Israel’s recent attacks, state media reported.

    In Gaza, at least 42,924 people have been killed and 100,833 wounded in Israeli attacks since October 7, 2023. An estimated 1,139 people were killed in Israel during the Hamas-led attacks and more than 200 were taken captive.

    What you need to know about Egypt’s truce proposal

•     Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, the Egyptian president, told reporters in Cairo that Egypt was proposing an initial two-day ceasefire in which four Israeli captives would be exchanged for a number of Palestinians held in Israeli jails.
•     El-Sisi said the initiative was a preliminary step for a permanent ceasefire.
•     He said negotiations to end the war should resume within 10 days of implementing the temporary truce.
•     There was no immediate comment from Israel or Hamas.
•     El-Sisi’s announcement came as directors of the CIA and Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency arrived in Qatar for talks to end the more than yearlong war on Gaza.
•     The Reuters news agency, citing an official briefed on the talks, reported that negotiations in Doha will seek a short-term truce and the release of some captives and Palestinian prisoners.

    Israeli bombing kills Palestinian in Gaza’s Nuseirat

    One person has been killed and several others wounded in an Israeli attack on a home belonging to the Abu Amuna family in the central Nuseirat refugee camp, according to the Wafa news agency.

    The bombing came as Israeli forces continued to strike Jabalia, Beit Lahiya and Shujayea in the besieged north.

    Our colleagues at Al Jazeera Arabic are also reporting that Israeli soldiers are blowing up houses in the southern city of Rafah. Israeli troops have yet to withdraw from Rafah despite promising that the ground invasion that began on May 6 would be a “limited” operation.

    Smotrich calls for ‘hundreds of thousands of new settlers’ in West Bank, Gaza

    Israel’s far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has again called for hundreds of thousands of new Israeli settlers to establish “new cities and settlements deep in the [West Bank]”, The Times of Israel reported.

    Smotrich made the remarks on Sunday at the Middle East Summit, a conference in Jerusalem sponsored by Israel365, a media outlet aimed at “pro-Israel” Evangelical Christians.

    He also used his speech to justify creating illegal Israeli settlements in Gaza, saying that without a civilian and “long-term military presence… there is no security and there is an existential threat to the State of Israel and its citizens”.

    Smotrich also called for forcibly displacing Palestinians to Arab countries, saying:

    “Those who do not want or are unable to put aside their national ambitions will receive assistance from us to emigrate to one of the many Arab countries where the Arabs can realise their national ambitions, or to any other destination in the world.”