By ABC News

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Israeli strikes and gunfire have killed at least 59 people across Gaza in the past day, according to health officials.

It comes a day after US President Donald Trump told reporters on Friday, local time, “it’s looking like we have a deal on Gaza”.

He did not give details, but is due to meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday.

Mr Trump also said talks on Gaza with Middle Eastern nations were intense and would continue as long as required.

His special envoy, Steve Witkoff, said the US president had presented proposals to the leaders of multiple Muslim-majority countries this week that included a 21-point Middle East peace plan.

Mr Trump told reporters he believed the US was close to achieving a deal that “will get the hostages back” and “end the war”.

In Gaza, meanwhile, the fighting continued.

Mr Netanyahu is opposed to ending the war until Hamas is destroyed.

Hamas said it had not seen Mr Trump’s ceasefire plan.

The comments came after Israeli newspaper Haaretz cited sources saying Hamas had agreed in principle to release all the Israeli hostages it holds in return for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners and the gradual withdrawal of Israeli troops under Mr Trump’s plan.

Also included in the proposal were the end of Hamas rule in Gaza, and Israel agreeing not to annex the territory and drive out Palestinians living there, Haaretz reported.

“Hamas has not been presented with any plan,” a Hamas official, who asked not to be named, told Reuters.

Israel expands Gaza assault

Among the 59 people killed on Saturday were those hit by two strikes in the Nuseirat refugee camp — nine from the same family in a house and, later, 15 in the same camp, including women and children, according to staff at Al Awda Hospital, where the bodies were brought.

Five others were killed when a strike hit a tent for the displaced, according to Nasser Hospital, which received the dead.

Strikes also demolished a house in Gaza City’s Tufah neighbourhood, killing at least 11 people, more than half of them women and children, according to Al-Ahly Hospital, where the bodies were brought.

Four other people were killed when an air strike hit their homes in the Shati refugee camp, according to Shifa Hospital.

Six other Palestinians were killed by Israeli gunfire while seeking aid in southern and central Gaza, according to the Nasser and Al Awda hospitals.

Israel’s army said it was not aware of anyone being killed by gunfire on Saturday in southern Gaza, nor of a strike in the Nuseirat area during the time and at the location provided by the hospital.

The director of Shifa Hospital in Gaza City told The Associated Press that medical teams there were concerned about Israeli “tanks approaching the vicinity of the hospital,” restricting access to the facility where 159 patients are being treated.

“The bombardment has not stopped for a single moment,” Dr Mohamed Abu Selmiya said.

He added that 14 premature babies were treated in incubators in Helou Hospital, though the head of neonatal intensive care there, Nasser Bulbul, has said that the facility’s main gate was closed because of drones flying over the building.

More than 300,000 people have fled Gaza City, which is experiencing famine, but up to 700,000 remain, many because they can’t afford to relocate.

Pressure grows on Netanyahu to end the war

The attacks came after a defiant Mr Netanyahu told fellow world leaders at the UN General Assembly on Friday that his nation “must finish the job” against Hamas in Gaza. Forty-eight hostages are still held captive there, around 20 of them believed by Israel to be alive.

Mr Netanyahu’s words began after dozens of delegates from multiple nations walked out of the UN General Assembly Hall en masse on Friday morning.

“You were like the last of the lepers. Netanyahu, we promise you that if you don’t bring a comprehensive agreement and end the war, you will forever be a leper,” said Itzik Horn, the father of Eitan Horn, one of the hostages held in Gaza since the Hamas attack that started the war. He was referencing the UN speech and Israel’s isolation.

“My son Eitan sleeps sick and starving on the floor of a tunnel in Gaza or, worse, is used as a human shield against IDF fighters. What will you save him with?” Mr Horn added Saturday evening.

International pressure on Israel to end the war is increasing, with a growing list of countries deciding recently to recognise Palestinian statehood, which Israel rejects.

Countries have been lobbying Mr Trump to press Israel for a ceasefire.

Hospitals are short on supplies and targeted by air strikes

Hospitals and health clinics in Gaza City are on the brink of collapse. Nearly two weeks into the latest offensive, two clinics have been destroyed by air strikes, two hospitals shut down after being damaged, and others are struggling with medicine, equipment, food and fuel in short supply, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.

On Friday, aid group Doctors Without Borders said it was forced to suspend activities in Gaza City. The group said Israeli tanks were less than a kilometre from its facilities, creating an “unacceptable level of risk” for its staff.

Israel has also halted aid deliveries through its crossing into northern Gaza since September 12, and has increasingly rejected UN requests to bring supplies from southern Gaza into the north, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said.

COGAT, the Israeli military agency in charge of transferring aid to the territory, said on Saturday that humanitarian aid to the northern Gaza Strip “continues on an ongoing basis,” and that it has increased significantly over recent weeks at a crossing into central Gaza.

Israel’s campaign in Gaza has killed more than 65,900 people and wounded more than 167,000 others, Gaza’s Health Ministry said. It did not distinguish between civilians and combatants, but said women and children make up around half the fatalities. The ministry is part of the Hamas-run government, but UN agencies and many independent experts consider its figures to be the most reliable estimate of wartime casualties.

Israel’s campaign was triggered when Hamas-led militants stormed into Israel on October 7, 2023, killing around 1,200 people and taking 251 hostage.