Gazans sought refuge in bombed-out hospitals as Israel vowed to “press harder” in its war with Hamas on Saturday, a day after the United States blocked a ceasefire bid at the United Nations. Aid groups say Gaza faces an “apocalyptic” humanitarian situation and is on the verge of being overwhelmed by disease and starvation.

At least 17,700 people, mostly women and children, have died in two months of fighting in the narrow strip of territory, according to the latest figures from Gaza’s health ministry.

Washington vetoed a UN resolution that would have called for a ceasefire on Friday, a move strongly condemned by the Palestinian Authority and Hamas, as well as humanitarian groups.

But Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a video statement: “I very much appreciate the correct stance the US took” and vowed to “continue our just war to eliminate Hamas”.

An AFP journalist said thousands of Gazans were sheltering in the Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City, which is no longer functioning and partly destroyed following an Israeli raid there last month.

Hundreds of makeshift tents made from scraps of fabric and plastic filled the hospital’s courtyards and garden amid collapsed walls.

Suheil Abu Dalfa, 56, from the city’s Shejaiya district, said he fled heavy bombardment by Israeli planes and tanks.

“It was madness. A shell hit the house and wounded my 20-year-old son,” he told AFP.

“We fled to the Old City, everything was just strikes and destruction… we didn’t know where to go,” he said. “We don’t know if they will storm the hospital again.”

‘Without anaesthetic’

Hamas health authorities said 71 dead arrived at the Al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital in Deir al-Balah alone over 24 hours, and 62 at Nasser hospital in the southern city of Khan Yunis.

An AFP correspondent in Nasser hospital saw a child on a makeshift stretcher and others waiting for care on the floor, while firefighters outside tried to douse a burning building partly destroyed by an Israeli strike.

Alexandra Saieh, of Save the Children, spoke of “maggots being picked from wounds and children undergoing amputations without anaesthetic”.

The situation “is not just a catastrophe, it’s apocalyptic,” added Bushra Khalidi of Oxfam.

Israel has vowed to eradicate Hamas after its unprecedented attacks on October 7, when militants broke through Gaza’s militarised border, killed about 1,200 people and seized hostages, 138 of whom remain captive, according to Israel.

Israeli army chief Herzi Halevi said it needed to “press harder” in its campaign in Gaza.

“We’re seeing more and more terrorists killed, more and more terrorists wounded, and in recent days we’re seeing terrorists surrendering — this is a sign their network’s falling apart,” he said at a ceremony in Jerusalem.

In Tel Aviv, some Israelis held a pro-peace demonstration, while others staged a performance calling for the hostages to be brought home.

‘Into the abyss’

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called a rare Security Council vote on a ceasefire on Friday, saying “the people of Gaza are looking into the abyss”.

But it was vetoed by the US, whose envoy Robert Wood said it was “divorced from reality” and “would leave Hamas in place, able to repeat what it did on October 7”.

Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen said a ceasefire would save Hamas “which is committing war crimes and crimes against humanity, and would enable it to continue ruling the Gaza Strip”.

Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas said he “holds the United States responsible for the bloodshed of Palestinian children, women and elderly people” after the veto.

Avril Benoit, head of the Doctors Without Borders (MSF) charity, described the US veto as a “sharp contrast to the values it professes to uphold”.

There was anger, too, in a residential area of Rafah decimated by an Israeli strike.

“What resolution did the Security Council ever approve and was implemented for our cause and Palestinian people?” local resident Mohammed al-Khatib said amid the rubble.

Iran, which backs Hamas, warned it could lead to an “uncontrollable explosion in the situation of the region”, while Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan denounced the UN body as the “Israel protection council”.

Hostage killed

An estimated 1.9 million of Gaza’s 2.4 million people have been displaced.

Blocked from leaving the narrow territory, they have turned Rafah near the crossing with Egypt into a vast camp.

The Israeli army says it has lost 93 soldiers in the campaign, with two others injured in a failed bid to rescue hostages on Thursday night.

Hamas said a hostage, 25-year-old Sahar Baruch, was killed in the operation, later confirmed by his kibbutz community in Beeri, one of the worst-hit on October 7.

With air, naval and ground combat continuing, the military said troops found weapons in a school in Gaza City and were fired upon from an UN agency school and mosque.

Hamas’s armed wing said it fired rockets towards Reim in southern Israel — the site of the Supernova music festival where 364 people were killed on October 7, according to Israeli figures.

There are fears of a wider regional conflict, with regular exchanges between Israel and Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah movement.

Israel’s army said it retaliated on Saturday after unspecified “launches” from Lebanon, including with fighter jets.

Violence has also surged in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, where the military says it has arrested 2,200 people, 1,800 of them Hamas members, since the Israel-Hamas war began.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Amid the protest over the appointment of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen’s Akbaruddin Owaisi as a pro-tem Speaker of the assembly, Telangana Minister and Congress leader Uttam Kumar Reddy on Saturday said that “It is a normal procedure and added that the Congress party did what was the right thing to do”.

“Going by seniority in Assembly, I should have been the pro-tem Speaker, the senior most MLA in the Congress party, but since I have taken an oath as a minister, the procedure didn’t allow me to be a pro-tem Speaker. So then we looked at other 6-term MLAs, the most senior MLAs. Akbaruddin Owaisi is the most senior MLA among all the parties. So it is a normal procedure,” he told ANI.

Further, Reddy defended the appointment of an All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) MLA as the pro-tem Speaker, stating it was a normal procedure followed even during the previous BRS government. He emphasised that the decision was made based on what was right, not due to any external factors.

“When the BRS government was there last time, they had an AIMIM MLA as the pro-tem Speaker. This has nothing to do with anything else. We did what was the right thing to do. I cannot comment on the future equation with AIMIM. That’s for our state leadership to discuss with everybody. And also for our national leadership to discuss and give us a direction,” Telangana Minister Uttam Kumar Reddy said.

Meanwhile, objecting to the appointment of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen’s Akbaruddin Owaisi as a pro-tem Speaker of the assembly, Telangana Bharatiya Janata Party chief and Union minister G Kishan Reddy said on Saturday that the BJP decided to boycott the oath-taking event, alleging violation of assembly rules in the appointment of pro-tem Speaker.

G Kishan Reddy further said that the BJP will go to the Governor on the issue of the pro-tem Speaker.

“BJP is against the appointment of Akbaruddin Owaisi as Pro-tem Speaker (of Telangana Assembly). This is against the tradition of appointing senior MLAs to the post.The BJP MLAs will boycott taking oaths before this pro-tem Speaker,” he said.

“Our MLAs will take oaths after a speaker is appointed. We will never ally with such a party (AIMIM). We will go to the governor on this,” he added.

The Bharatiya Janata Party accused the Congress government of ‘neglecting’ the senior candidates for the post and of defying the existing tradition of the House.

Citing violation of assembly rules in the appointment of pro-tem Speaker, he said, “There is a tradition of appointing senior leaders as the pro-tem speakers. However, they (Congress) have appointed Akbaruddin Owaisi due to their understanding with AIMIM. We object to this.”

On Friday, AIMIM MLA Akbaruddin Owaisi took oath as pro-tem Speaker of the Telangana Legislative Assembly in Raj Bhawan, Hyderabad.

The oath was administered by Telangana Governor Tamilisai Soundararajan. Telangana Chief Minister Revanth Reddy was also present on the occasion.

The governor appointed Akbaruddin Owaisi as the pro-tem speaker of the state assembly on Friday.

The first session of the third Telangana State Legislative Assembly began today.

The pro-tem speaker serves a temporary role, officiating the assembly session until the newly-elected members are sworn in and a speaker is elected.

Earlier on Thursday, twelve MLAs took oaths as ministers in a fresh cabinet in Telangana, along with new Chief Minister Anumula Revanth Reddy in Hyderabad. Revanth Reddy became the first Congress Chief Minister of the youngest state in India.

Congress won an absolute majority in Telangana for the first time, winning 64 of 119 seats.

Telangana Congress President Revanth Reddy won by a margin of 32,532 votes in Kodangal against BRS’s Patnam Narender Reddy.

Meanwhile, the Telangana BJP took to ‘X’ and criticised the new Congress government over the appointment of the AIMIM MLA as the pro-tem speaker.

“The Congress government in Telangana is like a nose that blows when it sneezes. That is why Telangana state BJP President and Union Minister @kishanreddybjp has expressed his opposition to the decision of the Congress to write off the tradition of the Legislative Assembly by assigning the post of Protem Speaker to Akbaruddin Owaisi to tame the Majlis Party and not the seniors in the Assembly”, said the party in a post on X.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Eight passengers, including a child, died after their car collided with a truck on the highway and caught fire late last night in Uttar Pradesh. The car, which was centrally locked, trapped the seven adults and a child to death in Bareilly, said police.

The burning car was spotted on the Nainital highway with the truck next to it, according to footage from the accident site. The doors of the car presumably got jammed after the accident and didn’t open.

The car had veered into the opposite lane and rammed a truck, said Sushil Chandra Bhan Dhule, Senior Superintendent of Police, Bareilly.

“The car collided with a truck on the highway near Bhojipura and got dragged, due to which it caught fire. It was centrally locked, hence the people inside lost their lives due to the fire,” said the official.

The passengers were on their way to attend a wedding, he said, adding that their bodies have been sent for post-mortem.