Thousands of people have died and thousands more have been injured since the militant group Hamas launched an unprecedented surprise attack on Israel on Oct. 7 and Israel retaliated with a bombing campaign and total siege of the neighboring Gaza Strip, leaving the region on the verge of all-out war.
Here's how the news is developing. All times Eastern.
Mar 1, 6:03 am
What we know about the conflict
The latest outbreak of war between Israel and Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that governs the Gaza Strip, has passed the four-month mark.
In the Gaza Strip, at least 30,228 people have been killed and 71,377 others have been wounded by Israeli forces since Oct. 7, according to Gaza's Hamas-controlled Ministry of Health.
In Israel, at least 1,200 people have been killed and 6,900 others have been injured by Hamas and other Palestinian militants since Oct. 7, according to the Israel Defense Forces.
There has also been a surge in violence in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. Israeli forces have killed at least 395 people in the territory since Oct. 7, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health.
The ongoing war began after Hamas-led militants launched an unprecedented incursion into southern Israel from neighboring Gaza via land, sea and air. Scores of people were killed while more than 200 others were taken hostage, according to Israeli authorities. The Israeli military subsequently launched retaliatory airstrikes followed by a ground invasion of Gaza, a 140-square-mile territory where more than 2 million Palestinians have lived under a blockade imposed by Israel and supported by Egypt since Hamas came to power in 2007. Gaza, unlike Israel, has no air raid sirens or bomb shelters.
Oct 24, 2023, 1:45 PM EDT
20 more aid trucks cross Rafah: Egyptian officials
Twenty more aid trucks crossed the Egypt-Gaza Rafah border on Tuesday and are now headed to the Israel-Egypt Nitzana Border Crossing for inspection, according to Egyptian officials.
It is not clear if the trucks have reached Gaza yet, where humanitarian conditions are worsening by the day, but these new trucks will bring the total to 74 aid trucks crossing through over the last four days.
People unload humanitarian aid on a convoy of lorries entering the Gaza Strip from Egypt via the Rafah border crossing on Oct. 21, 2023.
Eyad Baba/AFP via Getty Images
The Rafah border crossing was shut on Oct. 10 after it was hit by Israeli warplanes on the Palestinian side three times on Oct. 9 and 10.
The crossing has briefly opened each day since Saturday, permitting a small amount of aid to enter Gaza.
Asked by a reporter if humanitarian aid is getting to Gaza fast enough, President Joe Biden said Tuesday, "Not fast enough."
2:29
Aid for Gaza stuck at the border with Egypt
ABC News’ Matt Rivers is in Egypt as truckloads of aid are still waiting to enter Gaza where food and water are needed.
ABCNews.com
Oct 24, 2023, 1:26 PM EDT
Israeli, Palestinian Authority foreign ministers speak out at UN Security Council meeting
Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen and the Palestinian Authority’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Riyad al-Maliki, gave long, impassioned speeches at the United Nations Security Council meeting about the suffering their people are experiencing.
Palestinians walk by the buildings destroyed in the Israeli bombardment on al-Zahra, on the outskirts of Gaza City, Oct. 20, 2023.
Ali Mahmoud/AP
Cohen began by holding up photographs of the Israeli children kidnapped by Hamas, reading out their names and ages.
"They are just a few the many children and babies that have not seen evil. They have not caused evil. But they are victims of evil," he said.
Cohen described Hamas as "the new Nazis" and said Hamas' Oct. 7 attack on Israel should serve as "a wakeup call against extremism."
A photo hangs on a refrigerator next to bullet holes in a house at Kibbutz Kissufim in southern Israel, Oct. 21, 2023.
Francisco Seco/AP
Al-Maliki purported that Israel’s retaliation had equated to "ongoing massacres being deliberately, systematically, and savagely" perpetrated against Palestinians civilians.
"The Security Council has a duty to stop them," he said. "It is our collective human duty to stop them now."
Mourners attend the funeral of Palestinians from the al-Astal family, who were killed in Israeli strikes, in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, Oct. 22, 2023.
Ibraheem Abu Mustafa/Reuters
He suggested that Israel's campaign would ultimately lead to more conflict, saying "more injustice and more killing will not make Israel safer."
The foreign minister argued that everyone on the council should be united behind one goal.
"We should be on the same side -- all of us who believe in justice and peace," he said. "We should stand shoulder to shoulder in these moments. But that is only possible if everyone recognizes the value of Palestinian life -- the need to uphold Palestinian rights."
-ABC News' Shannon Crawford
Oct 24, 2023, 1:17 PM EDT
Blinken backs Israel but says 'humanitarian pauses must be considered'
Secretary of State Antony Blinken delivered a forceful defense of Israel’s military actions at the United Nations Security Council, but Blinken said "humanitarian pauses must be considered" to protect civilians in Gaza -- the administration’s strongest statement of a support for any type of halt in Israel’s efforts to vanquish Hamas.
Palestinians react at the site of an Israeli strike on a house, in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, October 24, 2023.
Ibraheem Abu Mustafa/Reuters
"We must affirm the right of any nation to defend itself and to prevent such heart from repeating itself. No member of this council, no nation in this entire body. could or would tolerate the slaughter of its people," Blinken said.
The secretary said every member of the U.N. has a "responsibility to denounce the member states that arm, fund and train Hamas or any other terrorist group that carries out such horrific acts,” reminding them that many other foreign nationals were also killed and kidnapped in its attacks."
People react as residents of Tel Aviv show support and solidarity with the families of hostages who are being held in Gaza, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Tel Aviv, Israel, Oct. 21, 2023.
Ammar Awad/Reuters
Blinken then turned to ongoing efforts to protect civilian lives, first emphasizing that Hamas is responsible for putting the innocent in harm’s way, before shifting to Israel’s responsibilities.
“Hamas must cease using them as human shields,” he said. “Israel must take all possible precautions to avoid harm to civilians. It means means food, medicine and water and other assistance must flow into Gaza and to the areas people need them. It means civilians must be able to get out of harm's way. It means humanitarian pauses must be considered for these purposes.”
Palestinians carry a child casualty at the site of an Israeli strike on a house, in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, October 24, 2023.
Ibraheem Abu Mustafa/Reuters
Previously, the State Department and other U.S. officials flatly rejected calls for any kind of ceasefir, arguing, as State Department spokesperson Matt Miller did Monday, that it would “give Hamas the ability to rest, to refit and to get ready to continue watching terrorist attacks against Israel.”
In his remarks, Blinken also detailed the administration’s efforts to prevent the conflict from spreading in the Middle East, but emphasized the threat posed by Iran and promised the U.S. would not allow attacks on Americans to go unanswered.
“We do not want this war to widen, but if Iran or its proxies attack U.S. personnel anywhere, make no mistake -- we will defend our people, we will defend our security -- swiftly and decisively,” he vowed.
-ABC News' Shannon Crawford
Oct 24, 2023, 1:06 PM EDT
Israeli UN ambassador calls on UN Secretary General to resign
Israel's ambassador to the United Nations, Gilad Erdan, is calling on U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres to resign, saying he's "completely disconnected from the reality in our region."
People leave their vehicles to take cover during a rocket attack from the Palestinian Gaza Strip along a main road in Tel Aviv on October 24, 2023.
Gil Cohen-magen/AFP via Getty Images
At the United Nations Security Council meeting, Gutteres delivered some of most forceful rhetoric on the Israel-Hamas war to date, demanding an immediate humanitarian ceasefire “to ease epic suffering, make the delivery of aid easier and safer and facilitate the release of hostages.”
The Secretary-General’s speech, especially his assertion that “the attacks by Hamas did not happen in a vacuum," sparked immediate backlash from Erdan.
"The shocking speech by the UN Secretary-General at the Security Council meeting, while rockets are being fired at all of Israel, proved conclusively, beyond any doubt, that the Secretary-General is completely disconnected from the reality in our region and that he views the massacre committed by Nazi Hamas terrorists in a distorted and immoral manner," Erdan said. "His statement that, 'The attacks by Hamas did not happen in a vacuum,' expressed an understanding for terrorism and murder."
"It’s truly sad that the head of an organization that arose after the Holocaust holds such horrible views," Erdan said.
"There is no justification or point in talking to those who show compassion for the most terrible atrocities committed against the citizens of Israel and the Jewish people," Erdan said.
Guterres' spokesperson, Stephane Dujarric, told ABC News, "The Secretary said what he said. Spokesman is not responding further."
3:35
A history of conflict: An ongoing war between Israel and Palestine
The Hamas terrorist attack on Israel this weekend comes amid the backdrop of a longstanding history of conflict over land and independence that has plagued the region.
