**US Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan in Riyadh on Saturday to discuss Gaza’s military escalation.
Mr Blinken is currently on a regional tour in the hope of stopping the conflict between the warring sides from spiraling into a devastating war in nearby countries such as Lebanon and Syria.
Here are the latest developments on the issue
No aid has so far reached the 2.3 million residents of Gaza, as medical supplies and fuel to power hospitals are running out. Some 220,000 displaced people are sheltering in schools run by the UN agency for Palestine refugees, UNRWA.**
More than 320 Palestinians have been killed in past 24 hours, including many women and children killed in Israeli air raids on convoys fleeing Gaza City, according to health officials in the besieged enclave.
Palestinians in Gaza holding a foreign nationality received emails from their embassies informing them of a new arrangement that would allow them to leave from the Rafah border crossing starting at midday today (09:00 GMT). This included Palestinians holding European, Canadian, American and Chinese passports.
An agreement has been reached for foreigners to exit the Gaza Strip through the Rafah border crossing later in the day.
Echoes of ‘a second Nakba’ surround Palestinians as Israel orders them to leave northern Gaza
International media have reported that thousands of Palestiniancivilians have fled northern Gaza after a warning from Israel.
At least 1,900 Palestinians were killed and 7,696 wounded in Israeliair attacks on Gaza.
The number of people killed in Israel has reached 1,300, with 2,800wounded.
Thousands of Palestinians fled to southern Gaza in search of refuge on Friday after Israel gave them 24-hour ultimatum to leave, as it amassed tanks for an expected ground invasion in response to a devastating attack by the militant group Hamas.
Saudi Arabia “categorically rejects” the targeting of civilians in the ongoing Israeli bombardment in the Palestinian territory of Gaza, according to a news report.
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said Saturday that a plan by Israel to evacuate more than one million people out of northern Gaza in a single day was “utterly impossible to implement”.
Russia’s ambassador to the United Nations called for a “humanitarian cease-fire” in the Gaza Strip and Israel on Friday, while blaming the United States for the ongoing conflict.
Israeli shelling hit a group of reporters in southern Lebanon,killing one Reuters journalist and injuring several others, includingtwo from Al Jazeera.
Human Rights Watch has accused Israel of using white phosphorus inGaza and Lebanon, putting civilians at serious risk.
