Zürcher Nachrichten - Strikes kill 29 in Gaza, amid hostage release talks

Negotiations for the release of the remaining hostages have been ongoing, with the latest talks taking place in the Qatari capital Doha, where US President Donald Trump landed on Wednesday.

Netanyahu's office said the premier had discussed with Witkoff and his negotiating team "the issue of the hostages and the missing".

Hamas had on Tuesday said it called on Trump's administration, which recently began direct talks with the group, "to continue efforts to bring the war to an end".

Fighting meanwhile raged on in Gaza, where the civil defence agency reported that "at least 25 people were killed and dozens wounded" in Jabalia, in northern Gaza.

Another four people were killed in a strike on the southern city of Khan Yunis, agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP.

AFP footage from north Gaza showed women in tears as they kneeled next to bodies wrapped in white shrouds stained by blood.

"It's a nine-month-old baby. What did he do?" one of them cried out.

- Shortages -

Mohammad Awad, an emergency doctor in northern Gaza's Indonesian Hospital, told AFP that supply shortages meant his department could not properly handle the flow of wounded from the Jabalia strike.

"The hospital could not accommodate the wounded. There are not enough beds, no medicine, and no means for surgical or medical treatment, which leaves doctors unable to save many of the injured who are dying due to lack of care", he said.

Awad added that "the bodies of the martyrs are lying on the ground in the hospital corridors after the morgue reached full capacity. The situation is catastrophic in every sense of the word."

Israel imposed an aid blockade on the Gaza Strip on March 2 after talks to prolong a January 19 ceasefire broke down.

The resulting shortages of food and medicine have aggravated an already dire situation in the Palestinian territory, although Israel has dismissed UN warnings that a potential famine looms.

Medical charity Medecins du Monde said Tuesday that acute malnutrition in Gaza has "reached levels comparable to those seen in countries facing prolonged humanitarian crises spanning several decades".

Israel resumed major operations across Gaza on March 18, with officials later talking of retaining a long-term presence in the Palestinian territory.

- 'Full force' -

Following a short pause in air strikes during the release of US-Israeli hostage Edan Alexander on Monday, Israel resumed pounding Gaza.

Netanyahu said on Monday that the military would enter Gaza "with full force" in the coming days, despite ongoing ceasefire efforts.

He added that his government was working to find countries willing to take in Gaza's population.

The Israeli government approved plans to expand the offensive earlier this month, and spoke of the "conquest" of Gaza.

Of the 251 hostages taken during Hamas's October 2023 attack, 57 remain in Gaza, including 34 the military says are dead. Hamas is also holding the body of an Israeli soldier killed during a previous war in Gaza, in 2014.

The attack resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people on the Israeli side, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.

Israel's retaliatory offensive has killed at least 52,908 people in Gaza, mostly civilians, according to figures from the territory's Hamas-run health ministry, which the United Nations considers reliable.

F.Carpenteri--NZN