Israel-Gaza updates: Blinken, Abbas meet on restoring 'calm' in West Bank, State Department says

The top U.S. diplomat made an unannounced stop in the West Bank on Sunday.

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.

Click here for updates from previous days.


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.


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Last planned US charter flight to leave Tel Aviv Tuesday

The last planned U.S. charter flight out of Tel Aviv's Ben Gurion Airport is set for Tuesday, according to the State Department.

"Commercial availability remains limited out of Ben Gurion Airport," the State Department said. "Please go to Ben Gurion International Airport, Terminal 3 if you wish to depart Israel. U.S. Embassy personnel will be present to direct you and provide specific flight information. Be prepared to wait."

State Department spokesperson Matt Miller said the chartered flights are ending because there's no longer enough American passengers to fill them.

"It is purely a demand issue. We had a charter flight yesterday that had five people on it," he said Monday. "We've consistently seen the demand for our charter flights go down to where we had a lot of flights going out with 50% capability. I think the number of seats that we have offered, we have had something like 25% of that actually be filled."

"We have notified everyone that the charter flight tomorrow is the last one that we are currently planning, so if they do want to leave, now's the time to do it," he continued. "But we will always conduct assessments in real time about whether there's additional demand, whether circumstances change on the ground, and if we need to make additional arrangements, we will of course be open to doing so."


Hamas making 'number of demands' for foreign nationals in Gaza: State Department

State Department spokesperson Matt Miller said Hamas was making "a number of demands" for opening the Rafah border crossing between Egypt and Gaza to foreign nationals, including the 500 to 600 Americans who are trapped in Gaza.

"Hamas is making a number of demands before they’ll allow people to leave Gaza. I’m not going to speak to those demands, but it's something we're continuing to try to work through," he said.

-ABC News' Shannon Crawford


US making 'significant progress' on getting fuel into Gaza: State Department

State Department spokesperson Matt Miller claimed Monday that the U.S. was making "significant progress" on getting fuel into Gaza via a "reliable delivery mechanism" that would assuage Israel's fear that it could be intercepted by Hamas.

"Fuel is essential to the delivery of humanitarian assistance, the desalinization of water and the provision of medical care and we want to see it provided for those purposes as soon as possible," Miller said. "I should note that even as we work to provide fuel for these essential humanitarian services, Hamas continues to maintain extensive fuel reserves. Rather than provide that fuel to hospitals or aid workers or for other civilian needs, however, it continues to hoard it for the benefit of its fighters and to carry out its terrorist attacks against Israel."

-ABC News' Shannon Crawford


26 more aid trucks entered Gaza Monday

Twenty-six more aid trucks entered Gaza through the Egypt-Gaza Rafah border crossing on Monday, Egyptian state TV reported.

The humanitarian crisis in Gaza has worsened by the day, with residents trapped without food, water, electricity and internet as Israeli strikes continue.

A total of 150 trucks have entered Gaza, according to State Department spokesperson Matt Miller.

"We aim to surpass that number today, tomorrow and beyond," Miller said Monday.


Blinken meets with Iraqi prime minister

Secretary of State Antony Blinken traveled to Iraq to meet with Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani on Sunday following the secretary's visits to Israel, Jordan and the West Bank.

Blinken told reporters that his meeting with the Iraqi prime minister was productive and said he emphasized the need to prevent spillover from the conflict in Gaza.

"I made very clear that the attacks, the threats coming from militia that are aligned with Iran are totally unacceptable," Blinken said. "We're not looking for conflict with Iran. We've made that very clear. But we'll do what's necessary to protect our personnel."

"We're working very hard to make sure that the conflict in Gaza does not escalate, does not spread to other places, whether it's here, whether it's elsewhere in the region," he said.

Blinken was asked about Arab leaders' instance that nothing short of a total cease-fire would be acceptable.

"I think everyone would welcome humanitarian pauses -- there's no doubt about that," Blinken responded.

He said pauses "advance things that we're all trying to accomplish," including getting more humanitarian aid into Gaza, getting people out of Gaza and getting hostages home.

On his meeting with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, Blinken said the PA was "playing a very important role right now in the West Bank in trying to keep stability there."

-ABC News' Shannon Crawford