At least nine Palestinians were killed in Israeli airstrikes across Gaza Sunday, even as President Donald Trump touted a breakthrough in implementing last year's cease-fire agreement.
Israeli Energy Minister Eli Cohen said Sunday that there was no deal to halt attacks on Gaza and that he saw a need for Israel, which already controls 70% of the Strip, to take full control of it.
Cohen is a member of Prime Minister Netanyahu's Security Cabinet, a small circle of ministers that oversees security and diplomatic policy.
Palestinian health officials said Israeli warplanes carried out separate strikes across the enclave in the northern Gaza City, central city of Deir al-Balah, and the southern area of Khan Younis.
A man and his wife were killed and four people were wounded in an airstrike on an apartment in Deir al-Balah, while two more people, including a child, were killed in a strike on an apartment in Gaza City, medics said.
A father, mother and their 9-year-old son were killed around dawn after a strike on a house in the Mawasi area of Khan Younis. Another person was killed near Jabalia in northern Gaza.
The Israeli military claimed the strikes in Deir al-Balah were targeting two members of Hamas' elite "Nukhba" force. The Gaza City and Jabalia strikes also targeted so-called "military operatives," but the military was still reviewing the situation, it said.
Israel has killed at least 1,230 Palestinians since the October cease-fire.
Trump said Thursday there had been a breakthrough after Hamas agreed to disarm under a U.S.-backed initiative to implement the cease-fire agreement reached last year in Egypt.
Trump's Board of Peace, the U.S.-led body overseeing the cease-fire, published Friday a 15-point roadmap setting out the final steps for implementing the agreement.
The roadmap has yet to be implemented. Hamas has said it will hand over its weapons for storage only after Israel halts military operations and withdraws its forces in line with last year's agreement.
An Israeli official told Reuters there would be no withdrawal from the military's current positions unless Hamas undergoes "genuine disarmament."
Cohen told Army Radio he did not believe Hamas would disarm, but that it would rather play games and try to hide its weaponry.
Netanyahu has not commented publicly on the initiative, while Jewish extremist National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir has called it unacceptable and said Israel should continue assassinating Hamas leaders.
Former senior Fatah official Mohammed Dahlan, who is based in the United Arab Emirates, said in a Facebook post that Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law and a senior adviser involved in the U.S. initiative, had told him he was working with the Israeli side to stop attacks on Gaza.
Dahlan said contacts with the U.S. were continuing to ensure the agreement was fully implemented, adding that its success now depended on Israel fully ending its daily attacks on Gaza.
