The viral messages from hundreds of public WhatsApp groups in India contained graphic images and videos, including many from Syria and Afghanistan falsely labelled as being from Israel, with captions in Hindi that called Muslims evil.

Wails filled the dusty air as volunteers clawed through the concrete blocks and twisted metal at the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza in a desperate search for bodies and survivors, with AFP video footage showing at least 47 corpses being recovered.

His wearing of the badge, which has come to symbolise the oppression of Jews since its imposition in Nazi-occupied Europe, was swiftly criticised by Yad Vashem, Israel's Holocaust memorial, which urged him to wear the Israeli flag instead.

President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo announced that the first batch of humanitarian aid from Indonesia would be dispatched to Palestine this week.

Netanyahu also told a press conference that other countries must give more help in the struggle to free more than 230 hostages kidnapped by Hamas in its October 7 attacks.

Israeli ground forces fought inside the Gaza Strip and air strikes pounded the besieged Hamas-run Palestinian territory in response to the October 7 attacks -- the deadliest in Israel's history.

Israel has been pounding the tiny Palestinian territory since Hamas gunmen stormed across the border on October 7 and, according to Israeli officials, killed more than 1,400 people, most of them civilians.

"A short time ago, an IDF fighter jet attacked the launchers from which the launches were made last night from Syrian territory towards Israeli territory," the military said.

Israel unleashed a massive bombing campaign after Hamas gunmen stormed across the Gaza border on October 7, killing 1,400 people, mostly civilians, and seizing 230 hostages, according to Israeli officials.

The United Nations warned of a looming "unprecedented avalanche of human suffering" inside the Gaza Strip, following weeks of relentless bombing by Israel, while the General Assembly pushed for an "immediate humanitarian truce".

Israeli ground forces made limited ground incursions on Wednesday and Thursday nights.

Indonesia has called on the UN General Assembly to set up an independent commission to investigate what its top diplomat described as a “crime against humanity” in the Gaza Strip.

The ministry acted after US President Joe Biden and the Israeli military questioned the casualty figures issued by authorities in Gaza, which is controlled by the Islamist Hamas movement.

Indonesia has stood firm in its clarion call for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip, which is currently besieged and blockaded by Israel, as the international response is thwarted by the “selective moral policing” of the West.

The rival powers went ahead and put forward texts doomed to defeat despite what diplomats said was a last-ditch effort led by France to delay a vote and work toward consensus.

Nearly three weeks after Hamas militants shocked Israel with an attack on southern Israeli towns in a rampage that killed 1,400 mostly civilians, world leaders sought to prevent the conflict from spreading.

"France is ready for the international coalition against Daesh in which we are taking part for operations in Iraq and Syria to also fight against Hamas," Macron told reporters alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem.

"We call for an unimpeded and continuous flow of humanitarian assistance and medical assistance to continue coming into Gaza," said Tamara Alrifai, spokesperson for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).

Israel has been bombing Gaza since Hamas gunmen poured across its border with the Palestinian territory on October 7 and, according to Israeli officials, killed more than 1,400 people, mostly civilians.

Rafah is the main route in and out of the Gaza Strip that is not controlled by Israel, and the focus of efforts to deliver relief to Gaza's 2.3 million residents.

Judith Tai Raanan, 59, and her daughter Natalie, 17, were handed over to Israeli forces at the Gaza Strip border on Friday, becoming the first captives whose release by Hamas has been confirmed by both sides since the latest round of Arab-Israeli bloodshed erupted.

Israel has vowed to destroy Hamas after the Islamist militant group launched a massive attack from the Gaza Strip on October 7, killing at least 1,400 people, mostly civilians who were shot, mutilated or burned to death, according to Israeli officials.

"China is willing to enhance cooperation with Egypt... and inject more certainty and stability into the region and the world," Xi told Mostafa Madbouli at a meeting in Beijing, according to state broadcaster CCTV.

Arab countries blamed Israel, which has rained bombs on Gaza since the bloody October 7 attack by Hamas, and protests erupted in Muslim countries from Egypt to Pakistan while Lebanon's Iran-backed Hezbollah vowed a "day of rage".

Indonesia urges the international community, especially the United Nations' Security Council, to immediately take concrete steps to stop attacks and acts of violence in Gaza following a strike on a hospital in the war-torn area.

Biden's trip to the Middle East was supposed to calm the region, even as he demonstrated US support for its ally Israel, which has vowed to annihilate the Hamas movement whose fighters killed 1,300 Israelis in a rampage on Oct. 7.

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said the deployment would allow the United States "to respond more quickly" to the crisis, while the White House stressed it did not intend to put US combat forces on the ground.

Biden's visit will mark a significant show of U.S. support for its top Middle East ally after Hamas gunmen killed 1,300 people during a rampage through southern Israeli towns on Oct. 7, the deadliest single day in Israel's 75-year history.

Taliban officials and ministers have at times travelled to regional meetings, mostly those focussed on Afghanistan, but the Belt and Road Forum is among the highest-profile multilateral summits it has been invited to attend.

Israel, seeking vengeance for an attack by Hamas on October 7, has declared war on the militant group, launching a relentless bombing campaign and warning more than a million people in northern Gaza to move south ahead of the operation.