JERUSALEM/GAZA CITY — A fresh round of Israeli air and artillery strikes killed at least 94 Palestinians across the Gaza Strip overnight while, hundreds of kilometres to the south, U.S. warships fired a second wave of missiles at Yemen’s Houthi rebels, underscoring the conflict’s widening geographic footprint, regional officials said Monday.
Gaza’s health ministry, run by Hamas, reported the deaths after what it called “the most intense barrage in days,” concentrated around Deir al-Balah and Khan Younis. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it was targeting “Hamas command nodes and rocket-launch teams” and released aerial footage of precision strikes, but did not comment on casualty figures.
In the Red Sea, U.S. Central Command said the destroyers USS Carney and USS Gravely launched Tomahawk missiles at radar and drone facilities controlled by the Iran-aligned Houthis, hours after the group claimed a new attack on a Singapore-flagged tanker. “These strikes are meant to degrade the Houthis’ ability to threaten international shipping,” a CENTCOM statement said.
Meanwhile on Israel’s northern frontier, Hezbollah fired more than 40 rockets toward the Galilee following the funeral of senior field commander Wissam Tawil, killed in an Israeli drone strike the previous day, according to the Lebanese group’s Al-Manar television. The IDF said it responded with airstrikes on launch sites near the towns of Yaroun and Aitaroun.
Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian warned that “unpredictable escalation” could follow if Israel presses its offensive in Gaza. “The region is at a strategic crossroads,” he told reporters in Tehran. Israeli officials dismissed the remarks as “saber-rattling.”
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said more than 1.9 million Gazans—over 80 percent of the enclave’s population—are now internally displaced, amplifying pressure on already strained aid corridors through Egypt’s Rafah crossing.
“The overlapping theatres of violence are feeding off each other,” said Lina Khatib, director of the SOAS Middle East Institute in London. “Every additional front, whether it is the Red Sea, Lebanon or Iraq, complicates cease-fire diplomacy.”
Diplomats from Egypt, Qatar and the United States are expected in Doha this week for renewed talks aimed at a staggered hostage-prisoner exchange that could pause the fighting, according to officials briefed on the plans. However, an Israeli government source cautioned that “gaps remain wide” over the length of any truce and the number of Palestinian prisoners to be released.
Analysts say the next seven to ten days will be critical. A successful shipping interdiction campaign by the Houthis could further jolt global energy markets, while a miscalculation on the Lebanon border risks drawing Israel and Hezbollah into a full-scale war—scenarios that would reverberate far beyond the Middle East.