Gaza death toll tops 25,000, Israeli strike on Syria 'kills Iranian spy chief'

As Gaza's death toll tipped over 25,000, fighting raged across the Strip on Sunday, after Israeli units launched new raids in the occupied West Bank and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is facing growing domestic criticism, rejected calls for post-war "Palestinian sovereignty."

Alongside fierce fighting in southern Gaza and across the besieged territory, missile attacks in Syria, Lebanon, Iraq and Yemen on Saturday raised fears of a wider conflagration, as Israel and the U.S. hit out at Hamas' allies in the region. 

Iran said five of its Revolutionary Guards - including a senior intelligence officer - were killed in a missile strike on a house in Damascus which it blamed on Israel, and security sources in Lebanon said an Israeli strike there killed a member of Iran-backed Hezbollah. The U.S. announced it had targeted a missile the Iran-backed Houthi group in Yemen was aiming into the Red Sea, which it called a threat to shipping.

Also on Saturday, missiles and rockets launched by Iran-aligned fighters in Iraq, where such groups have targeted U.S. forces, hit al-Asad air base, the U.S. Central Command said. A number of U.S. personnel were being evaluated for traumatic brain injuries and one Iraqi service member was wounded, it said.

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Meanwhile in Gaza, the health ministry reported at least 165 people had been killed over the previous 24 hours - more than double Friday's toll, with fierce attacks taking place in Khan Younis, south of Gaza City. Witnesses also said Israeli boats were bombarding Gaza City and other areas in the north early on Sunday.

Israel is pressing its push southwards against Hamas, after the military said in early January the militants' command structure in northern Gaza had been dismantled, leaving only isolated fighters. But Hamas has also reported heavy combat in the north of Gaza as Israel's military said its troops, backed by air and naval support, were striking resistance infrastructure throughout the Palestinian territory.

Israel has vowed to destroy Hamas in response to the group's October 7 attack that resulted in the deaths of about 1,140 people. Its consequent relentless bombardment and ground offensive in Gaza has now killed at least 25,105 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the Gaza health ministry.

Violence has also surged in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, where the military said it had demolished two houses in Hebron that it claimed belonged to two Palestinian gunmen who had carried out an attack on a road between Jerusalem and Bethlehem in November.

The official Palestinian news agency Wafa reported clashes between Israeli troops and Palestinian fighters in the West Bank village of Maithalun, south of Jenin, as well as in the West Bank towns of Arura and Qalqilya.

'Retain control'

The U.S., which provides Israel with billions of dollars in military aid, has publicly called on it to take more care to protect civilians but Prime Minister Netanyahu and U.S. leader Joe Biden have clashed over the future of a post-war Gaza.

Biden said it was still possible Netanyahu could agree to some form of Palestinian state, but Netanyahu's office said in a statement on Saturday Israel "must retain security control over Gaza to ensure that Gaza will no longer pose a threat to Israel". That, it said, was "a requirement that contradicts the demand for Palestinian sovereignty."

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said at the Non-Aligned Movement summit in Uganda the Palestinian right to statehood "must be recognized by all" and that its denial was "unacceptable". The UN agency for Palestinian refugees UNRWA says about 1.7 million people have been displaced in Gaza, with about one million crowded into the Rafah area. 

Israel this weekend dropped leaflets around the city showing photos of 33 hostages, their names written in Arabic, urging the displaced to make contact. "Do you want to return home? Please make the call if you recognise one of them," the leaflets read. More than 100 of the hostages seized by Hamas were freed during a short-lived November truce. Israel says 132 remain in Gaza, 27 of whom have been killed in captivity.

Those who want their return rallied in Tel Aviv, Haifa and near Netanyahu's Jerusalem residence on Saturday, demanding action to secure their release. Some carried banners calling for "elections now" to replace Netanyahu's hard-right government over its handling of the war. 

Iranian Spy Chief Killed

Hamas is part of the "Axis of Resistance", a regional alliance that includes Iran, Lebanon's Hezbollah, the Syrian government of President Bashar al-Assad, Shi'ite militia groups in Iraq and the Houthis who control much of Yemen.

Iranian media announced this weekend that an Israeli strike on Damascus killed the Revolutionary Guards' spy chief in Syria and four other Guards members, prompting a threat of retaliation from Tehran's foreign ministry. Iran's President Ebrahim Raisi vowed to punish Israel for the attack, calling it "crimes" that would not go unanswered, according to a statement on Iran state broadcaster IRIB. 

There was no comment from Israel, which typically does not discuss such attacks publicly. However, over the past three months Israel has repeatedly struck at Iranian targets in Syria, while Iranian-aligned groups in Syria and Iraq have fired at U.S. targets in those countries.

Aside from Gaza, the theater of conflict with the widest international repercussions has been the Red Sea, where the Houthis have repeatedly targeted shipping they say is bound for or linked to Israel. Some companies are avoiding the key waterway, dealing a blow to global trade, while the U.S. and Britain have launched missile attacks against Houthis forces in Yemen in recent weeks.

Deadly exchanges have also occurred regularly between Israeli forces and Lebanon's Iran-backed Hezbollah. Lebanon's official National News Agency reported two deaths in an Israeli strike on Saturday, and Hezbollah later said one of its fighters had been killed.

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