A mourner carries the body of Palestinian Rateel Al-Balawi, killed in an Israeli strike on a tent, during her funeral in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, July 30, 2026. (Credit: Ramadan Abed/Reuters)
Israel killed at least four people, including two children, in airstrikes on the Gaza Strip Thursday, health officials said, as mediators held new talks with Hamas leaders to work towards full implementation of a U.S.-brokered Gaza "peace" plan. Medics said an Israeli airstrike on a tent encampment in Khan Yunis, in the south of the enclave, killed a man and an eight-year-old girl.
In the Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip, an Israeli airstrike targeted a house killing an 18-month-old child and wounding at least eight people, medics said. Later on Thursday, an Israeli strike targeted a Palestinian man on a bike near a tent encampment housing forcibly displaced families in Gaza City, killing one person and wounding 10 others. The Israeli military said the strikes targeted Hamas militants, without providing further details.
The latest deaths add to a toll of more than 1,200 Palestinians, mostly civilians, killed by Israeli attacks since the cease-fire took effect, according to Gaza health officials.
Hamas does not usually disclose its losses. The truce halted full-scale fighting but has far from Israel's near-daily attacks. Meanwhile, four Israeli occupation soldiers have been killed by militants in Gaza over the same period.
Cairo talks
In Cairo, Hamas leaders were holding talks with mediators from Egypt, Qatar, and Turkey, over the implementation of the second phase of President Donald Trump's Gaza plan, as presented to them by his "Board of Peace," that oversees its implementation.
The plan called for a surge in humanitarian aid, governance by a civilian Palestinian administration, the disarmament of Hamas, the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza, and the deployment of an international force to help maintain security.
But progress has stalled in previous months. On Thursday, a Hamas official said the group was coming with a "positive and good" response, but he did not say whether the group had agreed to fully disarm — a key sticking point in the talks over the past four months.
Hamas wants Israel to commit to ending attacks on Gaza and withdrawing its forces.
Foreign control of Gaza
Sources close to Hamas said the group was willing to "confine and store" heavy weapons under a Palestinian body, but not hand them over to Israel. Hamas did not comment on that.
It is also not yet clear what would be the fate of light or personal weapons or how the U.S., the "Board of Peace," or Israel would respond to Hamas' position on the matter.
The diplomat involved in the talks said the roadmap under discussion in Cairo, in addition seeing all heavy and light weapons in Gaza decommissioned, would see authority transferred in phases to the U.S.-backed National Committee for the Administration of Gaza (NCAG), with "no exceptions" and under the principle of "one authority, one law, one weapon."
The diplomat said the plan includes the elimination of tunnels, weapons stockpiles, and weapons production facilities, adding that by the end of the process there would be no remaining militant infrastructure in Gaza.
The diplomat described the roadmap as being based on reciprocal steps rather than trust.
So far, the reality on the ground in Gaza remains far from this roadmap.
The Israeli military has continued to expand its military occupation of Gaza, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu saying that Israel intends to expand the area it occupies to 70% of the enclave.
So far, NCAG has been based in Cairo without announcing a timeline for its entry into the strip.
It remains unclear how many forces would be available to deploy with the International Security Forces (ISF), and whether Israeli troops would withdraw from the enclave.
In Cairo, two Egyptian sources said Hamas had agreed to several contentious points, including the handover of weapons, but requested changes to the document regarding the definition of the infrastructure to be dismantled.
Discussions on those requested amendments are under way in an effort to reach a mutually acceptable formula with the "Board of Peace," the sources added.
The "Board of Peace" declined immediate comment on the Cairo talks.
After nearly three years of genocidal warfare against the population of Gaza, which killed over 73,000 Palestinians and rendered nearly all of Gaza's two million people displaced, forcing them into makeshift tents or damaged buildings and under dire living conditions. The Gaza Strip is still under the de facto control of Hamas, in power since it won popular elections in January 2006.
