Deadly strikes were reported earlier today in the overcrowded Gaza border town of Rafah — dubbed a “pressure cooker of despair” by the UN — as international mediators readied a new push to seal a tentative truce deal between Israel and Hamas, AFP reports.

An AFP journalist in the city heard powerful explosions shortly after midnight on Saturday, with the Gaza health ministry later reporting 14 people killed in two strikes there.

The ministry said more than 100 people in total were killed across the territory overnight.

Hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians have fled south to Rafah since the outbreak of the escalation, with the former city of 200,000 now housing more than half of Gaza’s two million-plus population, a WHO representative said Friday.

Editorial

31 Jul, 2026

Expanding conflict

WITH neither of the belligerents willing to back down, and the theatre of conflict expanding geographically, the...
31 Jul, 2026

Spoils and spats

A FIGHT over assembly seats in Azad Jammu and Kashmir has laid bare what seem to be some deep resentments between ...
31 Jul, 2026

Unfair tax system

THE disclosure that the FBR collected nearly Rs1.9tr in sales and income taxes through electricity bills over the...
30 Jul, 2026

Debt that stays

THE power sector’s circular debt grew by Rs61bn in the last fiscal year, taking the total to roughly Rs1.67tr from...
30 Jul, 2026

HIV warning

THE HIV infections detected around two SESSI-run hospitals in Karachi demand far more than another hurried committee...
30 Jul, 2026

End trafficking

MODERN slavery, in the form of human trafficking, is among the state’s gravest failures. Scores of Pakistanis are...