Updates: Israel to send mediators to Qatar for Gaza truce talks with Hamas

To catch up on the release of Israeli-American captive Edan Alexander, see our story here.

Read our latest opinion piece suggesting that US President Trump is not abandoning Israel despite contrarian moves here.

Or for more on what’s going on in Yemen, check out this report on whether Israeli attacks are making a difference to the country’s Houthis.

We will soon be closing this live page. Here are today’s top events:

• A UN-backed hunger monitor warned that the entire Palestinian population in Gaza is at critical risk of famine, while 500,000 people face starvation.
• Hamas released Israeli-American captive Edan Alexander from Gaza after a deal was reached directly with the administration of US President Donald Trump.
• Israel is sending a delegation to Qatar on Tuesday to discuss the release of additional captives held in Gaza.
• UN agencies and human rights groups have renewed their calls for Israel to end its Gaza blockade, stressing that Palestinians are already dying from a lack of food and other critical supplies.
• Trump will undertake a three-day tour of the Gulf starting on Tuesday for his first state visit since retaking office in January.

Kate Phillips-Barrasso from the aid group Mercy Corps says it’s “absolutely heartbreaking” that Israel continues to block humanitarian relief into Gaza as Palestinians suffer from hunger.

“Supplies are literally miles away from people who are starving. So it is immensely frustrating and tragic. This is a crisis that’s happening in broad daylight,” she told Al Jazeera.

UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters that the United Nations secretary-general continues to plead with Israeli officials to allow food and other aid into the Gaza Strip.

“For all our meetings with Israeli officials, we continue to push for the reopening of the gates into Gaza. They have the keys to the lock. Those gates need to be unlocked,” he said.

The United Nations peacekeeping mission in southern Lebanon reports armed incursions continue by Israeli forces north of the Blue Line that violate a UN Security Council resolution that ended the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah war.

UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said that in the latest incident, a peacekeeping patrol reported that 10 Israeli soldiers crossed north of the Blue Line on Monday near Alma ash-Shaab.

Hezbollah’s chief Naim Qassem said Lebanon and Hezbollah have fulfilled their commitments under the November ceasefire, and the army has deployed in south Lebanon, “while Israel has not withdrawn, has not stopped its attacks”.

Israel “thinks that continuing its pressure and aggression could lead to the political end of the resistance”, he said, adding: “This will not happen.”

Hundreds of supporters packed the streets of the 21-year-old Edan Alexander’s hometown, hugging, jumping, and swaying to Israeli music blasting on speakers.

They cheered the news of his release from Gaza while watching a live news broadcast from Israel on a large video screen.

Shirly Zaifman, whose children went to school with Alexander, said his family is an important part of the town. “People are here for him because he brings people together,” she said.

Carley Peven, of Teaneck, New Jersey in the US, said: “We are overjoyed; we could use some good news while we still have 58 other hostages. We’re going to take this moment to celebrate.”

Her heart, she said, is “overflowing”. ”

“We’ve been fighting for this for over 500 days,” Peven said.

The World Health Organization says that “the people in Gaza are dying while WHO and partners’ medical supplies and food are minutes away, ready for deployment”.

The “WHO calls for the release of all hostages and a ceasefire. Peace is the only medicine”, it added in a post on X.

Medical sources told Al Jazeera that Israeli attacks killed 39 people across the Gaza Strip on Monday.

The dead include 17 people killed in an attack on displaced Palestinians sleeping in the Fatima Bint Asad School, in Jabalia, in the early hours of Monday morning.

It also includes three people killed in an attack on a tent camp for displaced people in the al-Mawasi area.

Palestinian student and peace activist Mohsen Mahdawi has talked to Al Jazeera about his US detention.

He was arrested during a citizenship interview and believes it was a trap to deport him in isolation.

Watch the interview here:

The UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon says that since a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah, it has uncovered more than 225 weapons caches in the south and referred them to the army.

Hezbollah chief Naim Qassem urged Lebanon’s government and the international community to act “more effectively” to make Israel comply with the November truce, which largely ended more than one year of hostilities between Israel and the Iran-backed group, including two months of all-out war.

Under the deal, Hezbollah was to withdraw its fighters north of Lebanon’s Litani River, and Israel was to pull all its forces from south Lebanon. However, Israel has kept troops in five areas it deems “strategic”.

The Lebanese army deployed to the area as Israeli forces pulled out and has been dismantling Hezbollah infrastructure.

“With UNIFIL support”, Lebanon’s army has “redeployed to more than 120 permanent positions south of the Litani”, the peacekeeping force said.

“Full [army] deployment is hindered by the presence of Israeli forces in Lebanese territory,” it added.

Israel’s military still carries out regular strikes in Lebanon, saying it is targeting Hezbollah fighters and infrastructure.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) says that the US president’s statements that he hopes to see an end to Israel’s war on Gaza don’t go far enough.

“Statements won’t stop starvation or reverse mass death,” CAIR said in a statement, urging Washington to take concrete action to pressure Israel to halt its devastating attack.

It also called on the administration of US President Trump to end its unwavering military and political support for Israel, and demand the unimpeded delivery of aid to starving Palestinians in Gaza.

Trump wrote on his Truth Social account on Sunday that he hoped the release of Edan Alexander, the US-Israeli captive, by Hamas would be “the first of those final steps necessary to end this brutal conflict”.

Mohammed al-Bursh has only managed to find a few cans of tuna and beans to bring for his 30-year-old son, Sobhi, who was wounded in an air strike three months ago. Sobhi’s left foot was amputated and he has two shattered vertebrae in his neck.

“Everything is expensive,” Sobhi said from Nasser Hospital in the southern city of Khan Younis.

He said he limits what he eats to help save his father money, but believes his body needs meat to heal. “It has been three months, and nothing heals.”

Another patient, Asmaa Faraj, 19, had only a small bag of dates, a date cookie and some water bottles. Her sister brought her some pickles.

“People used to bring fruits as a gift when they visited sick people in hospitals,” said the sister, Salwa Faraj. “Today, we have bottles of water.”

Hollywood actors, including Richard Gere and Susan Sarandon, denounced “genocide” in Gaza in an open letter released by pro-Palestinian activists on the eve of the Cannes Film Festival .

“We cannot remain silent while genocide is taking place in Gaza,” said the letter published by French newspaper Liberation.

The letter was signed by 380 world cinema figures including Mark Ruffalo, Javier Bardem, Spanish director Pedro Almodovar, and former Cannes winner Ruben Ostlund, it said.

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has denounced the fact that Gaza’s entire population is facing the risk of famine and expressed alarm that the vast majority of children experience “extreme food deprivation”.

UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said the dire report on hunger in Gaza released earlier by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification System shows that Israel’s 70-day ban on the entry of food and other supplies is “a human made catastrophe that the world should now allow”, Guterres’s spokesman said.

The UN and the secretary-general have repeatedly called on Israel to immediately open border crossings and allow 116,000 metric tonnes of food assistance waiting on the other side to be delivered, Dujarric said.

This could feed 1 million people for four months, he added.

Israel’s Danny Danon says that while the two countries remain strong, longtime allies, there have been recent instances where their interests have not been “aligned”.

The remarks were in response to an apparent rift between US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has been increasingly bypassed in recent weeks as the United States has proposed or brokered deals with a number of regional players, including Houthi rebels in Yemen and Iran – without consultation with Israel.

“We are partners and allies, but we are two independent countries,” Danon told reporters at the United Nations in New York.

While it’s “legitimate for the US to do what they think is good for the US”, it is also “legitimate for Israel to take action on things that are necessary to protect Israel”, he added.

UNICEF has shared a video showing a five-month-old Palestinian girl named Sewar who is struggling with severe malnutrition in Gaza.

“She is severely, acutely malnourished,” Jonathan Crickx, UNICEF’s Palestine communications chief, said in the clip shared on social media.

“If you look at her little legs, she just has the skin on her bones. When she cries, you can barely hear the sound because she’s so exhausted.”

"We have thousands of children affected by acute malnutrition. This must stop. The humanitarian aid must enter at scale inside Gaza.” – UNICEF’s Jonathan Crickx

A new report shows that children in Gaza are at risk of famine amid fighting, closed border crossings & food scarcity. pic.twitter.com/7VLsclydSq

— UNICEF (@UNICEF) May 12, 2025

Antonio Guterres’s call comes as he welcomed the release of Israeli soldier Edan Alexander from Gaza.

“I urge all involved to build on today’s release to reach a comprehensive agreement that will ensure the release of all hostages, an end to the hostilities, the provision of humanitarian aid & the long-overdue alleviation of the suffering in Gaza,” the UN chief wrote.

I welcome the release of Edan Alexander, who had been held hostage in Gaza.

I urge all involved to build on today’s release to reach a comprehensive agreement that will ensure the release of all hostages, an end to the hostilities, the provision of humanitarian aid & the…

— António Guterres (@antonioguterres) May 12, 2025

Yair Golan, the leader of the Democrats party in Israel, says “it is possible and necessary to bring back all the 58 remaining hostages” from Gaza.

“But for that to happen, Israel needs courageous, connected, and moral leadership,” the opposition politician said in a post on X that also welcomed the return of Alexander.