UPDATE 2035 GMT: France has broken with the US line on the conflict, criticizing the Israeli military operations.

“It was not acceptable that a country was threatened by missiles and that missiles landed on it, but the response must be proportionate,” French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said on State televisioin.

“When we are talking about 600 dead, it is obviously something that we can’t accept. The massacres and attacks must stop immediately,” he insisted.


UPDATE 2030 GMT: The Gazan death toll is now 625, with more than 4,000 wounded, according to the Palestine Health Ministry.


UPDATE 2025 GMT: Foreign airlines have been cancelling flights to and from Tel Aviv International Airport, following a Hamas rocket that struck a house nearby.

The cancellations started this afternoon with the US carrier Delta and continued with other American and European airlines.

Tonight the only airline flying is Ukraine International.


UPDATE 1545 GMT: US Secretary of State John Kerry has put the onus on the Gazan leadership of Hamas to accept a ceasefire.

Speaking in Cairo amid discussions of Israel-backed and Hamas-backed proposals, Kerry said, “My message is the same for Israelis and Palestinians” — an “immediate end to the fighting and a return to the ceasefire agreement that was reached in 2012” and then “a serious discussion, negotiation addressing the underlying issues”.

However, the Secretary of State tipped the balance, “Hamas has a fundamental choice to make, and it is a choice that will have a fundamental impact on the people of Gaza.”

In contrast, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon pushed Israel to halt military action:

Netanyahu was unmoved: “In the face of such terror Israel has no option but to defend itself….We will do what we have to do to defend ourselves.”


UPDATE 1535 GMT: The Washington Post produces a graphic of deaths in the conflict which illustrates the disproportionate casualties among Gazan civilians, including women and children.

Of the 519 deaths noted by the Post, almost 95% have been Gazans and more than 78% have been Gazan civilians.

Almost 25% of those killed were children and more than 13% were women.

GAZA DEATHS W CHILDREN

The Post’s figures are already out-of-date: the latest Gazan death toll is more than 600, compared to the 492 presented by the site.


UPDATE 0925 GMT: Israeli forces have fired warning shots into Al Jazeera’s offices in Gaza City:

An Israel Defence Forces spokesman “could not, at this early stage, confirm or deny whether there had been indirect damage to the building from firing at nearby military targets”.

On Monday, Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman called for a ban on Al Jazeera’s broadcasting, saying it put out “anti-Israeli incitement, lies, and provocations, and it encourages terrorists to act”.


See Gaza Feature: “We Saw Things That Will Forever Be Hard to Unsee — It Feels Like A War Against Children”


UPDATE 0808 GMT: Israel has rejected a proposal for a humanitarian ceasefire throughout Gaza.

The Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories, Yoav Mordechai, formally told United Nations envoy Robert Serry of the rejection.


UPDATE 0800 GMT: Killed or kidnapped? The ongoing mystery of a missing Israeli soldier continues this morning, as the Israel Defense Forces admitted that his body was not returned to Israel with six other troops killed on Sunday in Gaza.

The IDF said that it presumed the soldier was dead.

On Sunday, the Al-Qassam Brigades, the military branch of Hamas, said that it had captured “Shaul Aron”, posting what it claimed was his ID:

SHAUL ARON ISRAEL GAZA

The Israeli military denied the abduction. This morning it finally confirmed the soldier’s name as Oron Shaul and repeated the belief that he is dead.


OPENING SUMMARY: As diplomats gathered in Egypt to discuss ceasefire proposals, the death toll in Gaza from Israeli attacks passed 580 and the number of displaced passed 100,000 — more than 5% of the population — on Monday.

A spokesman for Gaza’s emergency services said 583 people have been killed in the territory since July 8, with more than 3,600 wounded. Monday’s attacks killed at least 56 people, including 16 children.

Eleven people, including five children, died when an airstrike hit a residential tower block in central Gaza City. Five staff and patients were killed and at least 70 were wounded as Israeli tank shells struck the third floor of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in central Gaza.

Amnesty International cited the shelling of the hospital and the “continuing bombardment of civilian homes” as “possible war crimes that demand an urgent independent international investigation”.

Meanwhile, the number of people fleeing their homes and seeking shelter in United Nations facilities continues to rise sharply, according to UN spokesman Chris Gunness:

About 20,000 people entered the shelters on Monday, and Gunness’s number — more than twice that of Gazans displaced in the 2008-2009 war — is conservative:

On the Israeli side, nine soldiers were killed yesterday, including four hit by an anti-tank rocket fired by Gazan fighters who infiltrated into southern Israel near a kibbutz.

Israel has lost 27 soldiers since its ground invasion began last Thursday. Two Israeli civilians have died from Gazan rockets launched across the border.

In Cairo, US Secretary of State John Kerry and United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon joined diplomats from the region, amid attempts to merge Israel-supported and Hamas-supported proposals for a ceasefire.

Egypt, which has tabled an initiative backed by West Jerusalem for more than a week, indicated on Monday that amendments to meet the conditions of the Gazan leadership were possible.

The shift occurred after Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas and Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal met in Doha to discuss details of a proposal brokered by Qatar.

Hamas is calling for any ceasefire to include substantive provisions to lift the long-standing Israeli blockade on Gaza, recognize Palestinian fishing rights to 12 miles off the coast, and release detainees in the West Bank, including leading Hamas members seized last month.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held a firm line earlier on Monday, saying that the invasion could be expanded until “quiet was restored” to Israel.

(Featured Photo: Prayers over bodies of 26 members of Abu Jamea family, killed in Khan Yunis by Israeli airstrike — Hatem Ali/AP)