The World Health Organization today said it was “appealing to Israel to immediately rescind orders” telling people in north Gaza to head to the south, which it said involved over 1 million people.

“A mass evacuation would be disastrous — for patients, health workers and other civilians left behind or caught in the mass movement,” the WHO said in a statement posted to X. "With ongoing airstrikes and closed borders, civilians have no safe place to go."

An Israeli military spokesman early Friday ET said it has warned people in Gaza City and in northern Gaza to leave to the south within 24 hours, for what it says is the safety of civilians as it strikes Hamas.

“The Palestinian Ministry of Health has informed WHO that it is impossible to evacuate vulnerable hospital patients without endangering their lives,” the WHO said in a statement.

Israel’s air force is getting more U.S.-made bombs to help it destroy the labyrinth of tunnels used by Hamas militants in Gaza to conceal weapons, fighters and hostages. In the aftermath of Hamas’ surprise attack across Israel’s southern border, Israel has carried out a relentless bombardment of Gaza to try to take out Hamas’ weapons stockpiles and its vast tunnel system. But Israeli ground forces likely will be needed to clear out the tunnel network known as “Gaza’s Metro,” according to former U.S. officials and military officers.

“Clearly, they want to put as many of these out of commission as possible,” said Matthew Levitt, a counterterrorism expert and former U.S. senior national security official.

The tunnels are a “critical” military objective for Israel as it seeks to degrade Hamas’ armed forces and dismantle the militants’ infrastructure, said Levitt, now with the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a think tank.

The Biden administration said it is providing Israel with kits to convert unguided or “dumb bombs” into precision-guided munitions as well as small diameter bombs (SDBs) that experts say are effective weapons against underground targets. The weapons are supposed to enable Israel to target Hamas militants while minimizing harm to civilians, experts said, though humanitarian organizations have expressed concern over the plight of Gaza’s civilian population given the intensity of the Israeli air raids.

Read the full story here.

There may be a chance for Canadians in Gaza and their families to head into Egypt tomorrow, a Canadian Global Affairs assistant deputy minister Julie Sunday said.

“We learned this morning that there may be an opportunity for individuals to leave through the Rafah gate into Egypt tomorrow between 12 p.m. and 5 p.m.,” the official said at a news conference today (ET).

“We are actively engaging with Egyptian and Israeli authorities to ensure that Canadians, permanent residents and their family members, will be able to leave,” she said.

There are 485 Canadians in the West Bank and Gaza registered with Global Affairs, which among other things provides consular assistance, she said.

Canadian Armed Forces flights have also been getting Canadians out of Israel. Yesterday and today, CAF flights have transported 496 people from the airport in Tel Aviv, Sunday said. Two flights happened today and had either landed or were en route to Athens.

The government is aware of three Canadians who have been killed and four who are missing, she said. The situation in Gaza is "very difficult" and a lack of electricity is making communication difficult, she said.

JERUSALEM — On the Jewish holy day of Shabbat, families across Israel were mourning loved ones and praying for those who remain missing.

At one of Jerusalem’s holiest sites, the Western Wall, a mother of seven said that the “heart can’t contain this incredible sorrow.”

“Every time I look at my own baby I cry,” she said.

At a dinner table in a Jerusalem home, the mother of a missing 19-year-old woman described the “living hell” her family was enduring.

“I can’t help her,” said the mother, who believes her daughter was kidnapped Saturday morning from her safe room.

“We can’t sleep, we can’t eat,” she said. “I have no air. I can’t breathe.”

WASHINGTON — Former President Donald Trump falsely characterized Israel’s role in his administration’s assassination of Iran’s top general during remarks this week, according to three U.S. officials familiar with the planning of the operation.

Trump said Wednesday that Israel planned to be part of the January 2020 operation that killed Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani but abruptly backed out the night before it was to take place. In his remarks, delivered before an audience at his Mar-a-Lago club in South Florida, Trump sharply criticized Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for that decision after months of working with the U.S. on the operation. 

But the U.S. officials familiar with the planning said Trump’s comments are entirely false. “They were never on board with it,” said a former senior White House official, referring to the Israelis. “They always thought it was a dangerous and destabilizing idea.”

One former Trump administration official familiar with the planning said that in Washington, when Trump made the decision to go ahead with the Soleimani strike, the generals who were present seemed to collectively take a deep breath.

The CIA declined to comment. The Trump campaign, the U.S. military’s Central Command and the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C., did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Read the full story here.

The U.S. has not urged Israel to delay its ground operation in Gaza until safe passage for Palestinians can be secured, a senior U.S. official told NBC News, denying a Fox News report. 

The U.S. believes Israel is trying to minimize harm to civilians but, given that rocket attacks from Gaza have continued for a week, Israel has a need, a right and an obligation to respond with the operations they deem necessary, a senior state department official said tonight.

Secretary Blinken said today that the U.S. was focused on creating safe zones in Gaza in coordination with international organizations and other countries, but acknowledged they were still working on the details.

“We’re very actively engaged with U.N. relief agencies, with the ICRC, with others to address the acute humanitarian needs of people in Gaza — to protect them from harm and make sure that they have the ability to get what they need,” he said.

There are 500 to 600 Americans living in Gaza, and the U.S. is continuing discussions with Israel and Egypt to ensure safe passage for those who want to leave. That safe passage hinges on Egypt agreeing to keep the Rafah crossing open, the only path into Sinai from Gaza. U.S. discussions with Egypt have focused on American citizens and other foreign nationals, a senior state department official said today, but have not involved the same push for safety for Palestinians.

"Any American citizen that’s in Gaza or in Israel, we certainly want to hear from them and we will do everything we can to help them leave if they want to leave,” National Security Council Coordinator for Strategic Communications John Kirby said today. “Now, obviously, it’s different geography, different challenges, but that doesn’t mean that we aren’t still committed to that and to make it work. And that includes the West Bank.”

Among those civilians in Gaza are believed to be American hostages.

“We are trying to secure the release of the hostages. Period. We recognize the brutality of the organization that has taken these hostages and are very clear-eyed about that, but we’re doing everything we can to secure their release, including asking other countries that have any leverage at all to bring that leverage to bear,” a senior state department official said today. “At the same time, we recognize that Israel has just very legitimate needs here.”

MIAMI — Around 150 people assembled in downtown Miami today to protest Israel Defense Forces’ offensive in Gaza, chanting "Free Palestine" and waving Palestinian flags.

"We think Jewish lives are precious. We think Palestinian lives are precious," said Martha Schoolman, 53, from Coral Gables. “I’m horrified by the rush for revenge.”

Schoolman held a flag identifying herself as a member of “Jewish Voice For Peace,” which calls itself the “largest progressive Jewish anti-Zionist organization in the world.”

Across the street, a small group of demonstrators protested Hamas. Some held signs comparing Hamas to the Nazi regime.

Miami Police arrested one man when he stepped out of the Palestinian protest area and appeared to try and enter the pro-Israeli demonstration section.

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres said that the conflict between Hamas and Israel “has reached a dangerous new low” and called for immediate humanitarian access into blockaded Gaza.

"Even wars have rules,” Guterres told reporters today. “International humanitarian law and human rights must be respected and upheld.”

The secretary-general said that “civilians must be protected, and also, never used as shields.” He also called for all hostages being held in Gaza to be released.

Guterres today repeated U.N.’s position that Israel’s warning for 1.1 million people in northern Gaza to leave for the south is impossible.

“Moving more than 1 million people across a densely populated war zone to a place with no food, water or accommodation, when the entire territory is under siege, is extremely dangerous and in some cases simply not possible,” he said.

ASHDOD, Israel — There was an eerie calm as Israel’s deadline for 1 million Palestinians to evacuate a large and densely populated section of northern Gaza passed today.

From just north of Gaza, it wasn’t clear if the calm signaled that Israeli forces had sufficiently softened Hamas targets within Gaza ahead of an anticipated ground offensive.

During an unscheduled speech on television, Benjamin Netanyahu did not mention the offensive but sought to rally the country behind his efforts to “smash” Hamas.

Earlier today, the Israeli military told reporters a covert special forces unit was in Gaza trying to find dozens of hostages who were taken by Hamas militants a week ago. 

The military did not provide additional details about the mission but said the unit was involved in firefights with militants.

Israel’s military told the United Nations on yesterday afternoon Eastern Time that the entire population north of Wadi Gaza had to evacuate within 24 hours, a U.N. official said.