UN humanitarian aid operations in Gaza have ground to a halt, following fresh evacuation orders issued by the Israeli military on Sunday.
Israel issued evacuation orders for Deir Al-Balah in central Gaza, forcing more families to flee, saying forces intended to act against militant group Hamas and others operating in the area.
"The humanitarian situation is so awful that we've got no choice that to push the limits around risk acceptance and that is very concerning," a senior UN official told reporters at UN headquarters in New York this morning.
"What transpired over the weekend just brings us to the point where we just cannot continue to operate and it's not under our control."
"This is not a decision that we're saying we're stopping to operate but practically, we cannot operate," the UN official said.
The UN official said that the situation in Gaza was "unprecedented" but that the UN would not leave.
In recent days, Israel has issued several evacuation orders across Gaza, the most since the beginning of the 10-month war, prompting an outcry from Palestinians, the United Nations and relief officials over the reduction of humanitarian zones and the absence of safe areas.
The Deir Al-Balah municipality says Israeli evacuation orders have so far displaced 250,000 people.
Five killed in Israeli strike on West Bank
Israel said it carried out an air strike on the occupied West Bank, while the Palestinian Authority reported five killed in the incident.
"An aircraft attacked a short time ago an operations centre" in the area of Nur Shams, the Israeli military said in a statement, without providing a casualty count or specifying who was targeted.
"Five citizens were killed and others were injured," the official Palestinian news agency Wafa said.
The Times of Israel newspaper said a drone strike was carried out but the military did not say how the attack was staged.
A correspondent for Wafa reported hearing four loud explosions and said the strike targeted a house in the Nur Shams refugee camp.
Also in the West Bank, Israeli settlers shot dead one Palestinian and wounded three others in the Bethlehem area, according to the Palestinian health ministry.
Earlier, Israeli military strikes killed at least seven Palestinians in Gaza, medics said.
Two were killed in Deir Al-Balah, where around a million people were sheltering, two at a school in the Al-Nuseirat camp and three in the southern city of Rafah, near the border with Egypt.
The new orders forced many families and patients to leave Al-Aqsa Hospital, the main medical facility in Deir Al-Balah, where hundreds of thousands of residents and displaced people had taken shelter, for fear of bombardments.
The hospital is close to the area covered by the evacuation notice.
Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) said in a statement on X last night that an explosion approximately 250m away from the MSF-supported Al-Aqsa Hospital triggered panic.
"As a result, MSF is considering whether to suspend wound care for the time being, while trying to maintain life-saving treatment."
From around 650 patients, only 100 remain in the hospital, with seven in intensive care unit, it said, citing Gaza's health ministry.
"This situation is unacceptable. Al Aqsa has been operating well beyond capacity for weeks due to the lack of alternatives for patients. All warring parties must respect the hospital, as well as patients' access to medical care," it added.
The escalation comes with little hope of an end in sight to the war as diplomacy by mediators, Qatar, Egypt, and the United States has so far failed to close the gap between Israel and Hamas, whose leaders traded blame over responsibility for the lack of accord.
Neither Hamas, nor Israel, agreed to several compromises presented by mediators at talks in Cairo yesterday, two Egyptian security sources said.
A senior US official, however, described the talks as "constructive," saying they were conducted in a spirit on all sides to reach "a final and implementable agreement."
Hamas official Osama Hamdan said the group rejected new conditions made by Israel during the talks, which the group did not attend, and added that US comments over an imminent ceasefire deal were false and aimed to serve election purposes.
US President Joe Biden and his administration have faced growing protests in the US over aid for Israel ahead of November elections.
More than 40,400 Palestinians have been killed in the war, according to Gaza's health ministry. The crowded territory has been laid to waste and most of its 2.3 million people have been displaced multiple times and face acute shortages of food and medicine, humanitarian agencies say.
The war was triggered by Hamas' 7 October attack on Israel, which killed 1,200 people, according to Israeli tallies, with more than250 taken hostage.
Irish troops in Lebanon 'safe' - Tánaiste
Tánaiste Micheál Martin has said he is hopeful that all parties in the Middle East are ''pushing hard for a de-escalation'' in the region.
Mr Martin said analysts are claiming that Israel and Hezbollah appear to not want a full-scale war, but that the situation remains volatile nonetheless.
''Our troops [in Lebanon] are safe, they're vigilant and professional and have considerable experience in dealing with very tense situations'' he said.
The Tánaiste added that ''We need an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and the release of hostages and unimpeded access to aid''.
Mr Martin said that if a ceasefire was agreed in Gaza that would have an impact on the situation in Lebanon.
Additional reporting Reuters
