Israel-Gaza war live: UN chief condemns ‘violations’ of humanitarian law after six Unrwa staff killed in Israeli airstrike

10.43am BST

The European Union’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell Fontelles , is in Lebanon today. The Lebanese army have posted a picture of him meeting with army commander Gen Joseph Aoun , and said that, alongside the EU’s ambassador to Lebanon Sandra De Waele , they discussed the situation in the south of the country, where Hezbollah and Israel have been repeatedly exchanging fire for months.

10.30am BST

Israel’s culture minister Miki Zohar has said that only military power will push Hamas to come to a deal to release hostages from Gaza, but conceded that “there is no doubt that military pressure endangers the hostages.”

The Times of Israel reports that in an interview with Haredi radio station Kol BaRama, the Likud party minister said that protests against Benjamin Netanyahu’s government and calls for elections in Israel were hardening the Hamas negotiating position.

It quotes him saying:

Attempts to reach a deal did not succeed because we are facing a terrorist organisation that is not rational and only understands military power. We really want a deal and hope there will be a deal. The price Israel will need to pay is heavy.

There is no doubt that military pressure endangers the hostages. It’s not that we think the hostages are in a good situation. Their lives are in constant danger, especially when there is fire close to where they are, or even where they are. And this is the complexity of this war.

10.17am BST

Syrian media is reporting that in addition to killing two people in a drone strike on a vehicle inside Syria , Israeli forces have also shelled the Syrian town of Al-Rafid in the south-east of the country, close to territory controlled by Israel.

9.55am BST

Health ministry claims at least 34 killed and 96 injured in Gaza by Israeli attacks in last day

The Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza has said that Israeli attacks have killed at least 34 people and injured 96 over the past 24 hours in the territory.

It puts the total death toll since 7 October 2023 at 41,118 people killed, with 95,125 injured. The figures, which have not been independently verified, do not distinguish between combatants and non-combatants, and include women and children.

The ministry reported that there are more people trapped under rubble and in areas inaccessible to emergency services.

Gaza’s civil defence service earlier said it had recovered four bodies after an Israeli airstrike in Rafah . Other fatalities have been reported this morning in Jabalia camp and the Zeitoun neighbourhood of Gaza City.

There is limited media access to Gaza, and the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has recorded the deaths of at least 116 journalists and media workers during the course of the war, making it “the deadliest period for journalists since CPJ began gathering data in 1992.”

9.34am BST

Israel claims school attack that killed Unrwa staff was aimed at Hamas command and control centre

Israel’s Arabic language military spokesperson Avichay Adraee has posted to social media a message he says is regarding “the allegations and lies” he claimed have been spread about the Israeli attack on the Jaouni school in Nuseirat.

He claimed, without providing evidence in the post, that it was “formerly used” as a school but was “a Hamas command and control complex”. He claimed that “many of the names [of victims] published on social media and news channels belong to Hamas terrorists who were involved in terrorist activities against Israeli citizens and IDF forces.”

He claimed that the IDF had repeatedly sought more information from Unrwa on the six staff killed in the attack, but said “it did not respond to these requests, which were repeatedly conveyed to it”. The claims have not been independently verified.

Unrwa has said that six of its staff were killed in the attack, with the agency posting to social media to say “Among those killed was the manager of the Unrwa shelter and other team members providing assistance to displaced people. Schools and other civilian infrastructure must be protected at all times, they are not a target.”

Gaza’s civil defence spokesperson Mahmud Bassal said that it was the fifth time Israel has targeted the school since 7 October. He initially put the death toll of Unrwa workers killed at two, and said 18 people had been killed in total, and more than 18 others injured, including women and children.

Philippe Lazzarini , the head of Unrwa, has said that the staff who died in Wednesday’s attack had been providing support to families who had sought refuge in the school, and that at least 220 of his agency’s staff had been killed in Gaza since the start of the war.

In a statement Lazzarini lamented the “endless and senseless killing, day after day” in Gaza, adding “Humanitarian staff, premises and operations have been blatantly and unabatedly disregarded since the beginning of the war.”

Reporting for Al Jazeera from Deir al-Balah in central Gaza where the dead were being received at a hospital for burial, Hani Mahmoud said the scenes were “heartbreaking” and “chaotic”. He reported for the network:

This is not the first time we’ve seen UN-run evacuation centres attacked. These facilities are marked, their coordinates shared with the Israeli military. They are known to have turned into shelters for displaced families. But the UN’s blue and white colours on the shelters is not protecting the people inside.

Benjamin Netanyahu’s government has banned Al Jazeera from operating inside Israel, and Israel’s military has not permitted foreign media to operate inside Gaza. None of the claims have been independently verified by journalists.

Updated at 9.42am BST

9.02am BST

Reporting from Deir al-Balah in central Gaza, Hani Mahmoud of Al Jazeera has said that the scene at the hospital there where people are sayign farewell to loved ones killed in an Israeli strike yesterday on the UN-operated al-Jaouni school is “chaotic”.

He writes:

People are bidding farewell to their relatives pronounced dead at the hospital. One person who is in critical condition was pulled from the hospital just to say goodbye to family members killed in the attack. It was a heartbreaking scene.

Updated at 9.21am BST

8.25am BST

There are unconfirmed reports that Israel has killed two people in a drone strike inside Syria on the road from Quneitra in the Golan region to Damascus.

7.39am BST

Israeli media is reporting that overnight Israel’s security forces raided a hospital in Halhul, near Hebron, and arrested a suspect in an car bombing.

Reports say that members of Israeli security forces were in civilian clothing when they entered the hospital to detain the main. Haaretz reports he has been taken by the Shin Bet for questioning. The suspect had been injured in a car bomb explosion on 13 August.

7.31am BST

Local media sources put the death toll from this morning’s Israeli attacks on Gaza at five. Palestinian news agency Wafa reports that three citizens were killed and others were injured after a family house was bombed in Jabalia camp . Two people were killed and others injured in the bombing of a street in the Zeitoun neighbourhood of Gaza City.

Wafa also reports that Israeli forces “blew up residential buildings in the northern areas of al-Bureij camp” and alos carried out an airstrike on a house in al-Nuseirat camp.

The claims have not been independently verified.

7.22am BST

Al Jazeera reports that in the last couple of hours two people have been killed in an Israeli attack on the Zeitoun neighbourhood in Gaza City in the north of Gaza. Additionally, there has been a reported airstrike on the Jabalia camp in the north of the Gaza Strip.

7.21am BST

Overnight the IDF twice reported warning sirens sounding in Israel , once in northern Israel and once near the Gaza Strip. Both instances turned out to be false alarms.

7.17am BST

UN chief condemns ‘violations’ of humanitarian law after six Unrwa staff killed in Israeli airstrike

Hello and welcome to the Guardian’s live coverage of the Israel-Gaza war.

UN chief António Guterres has condemned an Israeli airstrike on a central Gaza school being used as a shelter for displaced Palestinians that killed 18 people, according to the Hamas-run territory’s civil defence agency.

“What’s happening in Gaza is totally unacceptable,” he wrote on social media, adding that six Unrwa workers were among the dead. “These dramatic violations of international humanitarian law need to stop now.”

Israel’s military claimed its air force had “conducted a precise strike on terrorists who were operating inside a Hamas command-and-control centre” on the school grounds.

An IDF spokesperson claimed that prior to the attack “a series of measures were taken to reduce the likelihood of civilian casualties, including the use of precision weapons, the use of aerial imagery, and additional intelligence.”

Here is a summary of the day’s other main news.

• Philippe Lazzarini, the head of Unrwa, has said that the staff who died in Wednesday’s attack had been providing support to families who had sought refuge in the school, and that at least 220 of his agency’s staff had been killed in Gaza since the start of the war.

• Elsewhere on Wednesday, a strike hit a home near the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis , killing 11 people, including six brothers and sisters ranging from 21 months to 21 years old, according to the European hospital, which received the casualties.

• Hamas said on Wednesday that its negotiators had reiterated their readiness to implement an “immediate” ceasefire with Israel in Gaza based on a previous US proposal without new conditions from any party. The group said in a statement that their negotiation team, led by senior official Khalil al-Hayya, had met mediators in Doha to discuss the latest developments in Gaza.

• CIA director William Burns, who is also the chief US negotiator on Gaza, said on Saturday that a more detailed ceasefire proposal would be made in the next several days . The previous proposal put forward by president Joe Biden in June laid out a three-phase ceasefire in return for the release of Israeli hostages. However lingering issues, including control of the Philadelphi corridor , a narrow stretch of land on Gaza’s border with Egypt, remain.

• Joe Biden has described the Israel Defense Force’s fatal shooting of the Turkish American protester Ayşenur Ezgi Eygi as “totally unacceptable” in his first extensive comments on her death . In a statement on Wednesday, Biden said that Israel had “acknowledged responsibility” for Eygi’s death, but he stopped short of backing the demands put out by Eygi’s family and other human rights advocates for an independent inquiry into the fatal shooting of the American activist at a protest in the West Bank town of Beita last week.

Updated at 9.02am BST