Israel makes 'extensive' strikes in Gaza, killing 326 and ending standoff over ceasefire

Israeli airstrikes pounded Gaza, killing at least 326 people, Palestinian health authorities said on Tuesday — collapsing a two-month ceasefire with Hamas as Israel vowed to use force to free its remaining hostages in the territory.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office accused Hamas of "repeated refusal to release our hostages" and rejecting proposals from U.S. President Donald Trump's mideast envoy Steve Witkoff.

"Israel will, from now on, act against Hamas with increasing military strength," his office said in a statement.

After heavy strikes, the Israeli army issued evacuation orders for a number of neighbourhoods in Gaza, according to the statement.

Meanwhile, Hamas accused Israel of overturning the hard-fought ceasefire deal agreed to in January, leaving the fate of 59 hostages still held in Gaza uncertain.

Strikes in Gaza were reported in multiple locations on Tuesday during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Officials from Gaza's Hamas-run health ministry said many of the dead were children.

Israel's renewed intense pressure on Hamas came as tensions flared elsewhere in the Middle East, a major supplier of oil to global markets, which has seen the Gaza war spread to Lebanon, Yemen and Iraq.

Trump said on Monday he would hold Iran responsible for any further attacks on international shipping carried out by the Houthi group, as his administration expanded strikes in Yemen — the biggest U.S. military operation in the region since he returned to the White House.

Strikes were reported in locations including northern Gaza, Gaza City, Deir al-Balah, Khan Younis and Rafah in central and southern Gaza Strip.

The Israel Defense Forces said it hit dozens of targets, and that the strikes would continue for as long as necessary and would extend beyond air strikes, raising the prospect that Israeli ground troops could resume fighting.

The United Nations' Humanitarian Coordinator for the Occupied Palestinian Territory urged for the ceasefire in Gaza to be immediately reinstated.

"Waves of airstrikes occurred across the Gaza strip since the early hours of the morning ... This is unconscionable," Muhannad Hadi said in a statement.

The attacks were far wider in scale than the regular series of drone strikes the Israeli military has said it has conducted against individuals or small groups of suspected militants and follows weeks of failed efforts to agree on an extension to the truce, which began on Jan. 19.

Israel has weakened Hamas and the group's Lebanese ally Hezbollah, killing their leaders while launching attacks on the Houthis, all members of what has been called Iran's "Axis of Resistance" against U.S. and Israeli interests.

Among those killed was senior Hamas official Mohammad Al-Jmasi, a member of the political office, and members of his family, including his grandchildren who were in his house in Gaza City when it was hit by an airstrike on Tuesday, Hamas sources and relatives said. In all, at least five senior Hamas officials were killed along with members of their families.

In hospitals strained by 15 months of bombardment, piles of bodies in white plastic sheets smeared with blood could be seen stacked up as casualties were brought in.

Some people were brought to overwhelmed hospitals by private cars.

A strike on a home in the southern Gaza city of Rafah killed 17 members of one family — including at least 12 women and children, according to the European Hospital, which received the bodies.

A spokesperson for the Gaza health ministry said the death toll had risen to 326.

In Washington, a White House spokesperson said Israel had consulted the U.S. administration before it carried out the strikes, which the military said targeted mid-level Hamas commanders and leadership officials as well as infrastructure belonging to the militant group.

"Hamas could have released hostages to extend the ceasefire but instead chose refusal and war," White House spokesperson Brian Hughes said.

In Gaza, witnesses contacted by Reuters said Israeli tanks shelled areas in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, forcing many families who had returned after the ceasefire to leave their homes again and head north to Khan Younis.

Negotiating teams from Israel and Hamas had been in Doha as mediators from Egypt and Qatar sought to bridge the gap between the two sides following the end of an initial phase in the ceasefire, which saw 33 Israeli hostages and five Thais returned by militant groups in Gaza in exchange for some 2,000 Palestinian prisoners.

Aid deliveries blocked

With the backing of the United States, Israel had been pressing for the return of the remaining 59 hostages still held in Gaza in exchange for a longer-term truce that would have halted fighting until after the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan and the Jewish Passover holiday in April.

However Hamas had been insisting on moving to negotiations for a permanent end to the war and a full withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza, in accordance with the terms of the original ceasefire agreement.

Each side has accused the other of failing to respect the terms of the January ceasefire agreement, and there were multiple hiccups during the course of the first phase. But until now, a full return to the fighting had been avoided.

The army did not provide details about the strikes carried out in the early hours of Tuesday but Palestinian health authorities and witnesses contacted by Reuters reported damage in numerous areas of Gaza, where hundreds of thousands are living in makeshift shelters or damaged buildings.

Much of Gaza now lies in ruins after 15 months of fighting, which erupted on Oct. 7, 2023, when thousands of Hamas-led gunmen attacked Israeli communities around the Gaza Strip, killing some 1,200 people, according to Israeli tallies, and abducting 251 hostages into Gaza.

The Israeli campaign in response has killed more than 48,000 people, according to Palestinian health authorities, and destroyed much of the housing and infrastructure in the enclave.