AFP, Geneva

The world must scale up efforts to alleviate the human suffering in Gaza, building on the momentum from the ceasefire’s first phase, the head of the Red Cross said yesterday.

The US-brokered ceasefire, which sought to halt the fighting between Israel and Hamas sparked by the group’s October 2023 attack, has been in place for more than three months despite both sides accusing the other of repeated violations.

Earlier in January, Washington announced the truce had progressed to its second phase, intended to bring a definitive end to the war.

“States must harness the momentum generated by the first phase of the agreement between Israel and Hamas to urgently improve the dire humanitarian conditions in Gaza,” Mirjana Spoljaric, president of the International Committee of the Red Cross, said in a statement.

Meanwhile, the Israeli military said yesterday it launched overnight strikes at “eight terrorists” in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, killing three of them.

It said that further strikes were launched and added that “soldiers continue to conduct searches in the area in order to locate and eliminate all the terrorists”.

Israel also announced that the crucial Rafah crossing between the Gaza Strip and Egypt would be reopened tomorrow, but only for the “limited movement of people”.