Nebal Farsakh - spokesperson for the Palestine Red Crescent, who is based in West Bank - tells BBC News they are "shocked" by the latest Israeli strikes.

One of their ambulances was indirectly hit by shelling whilst trying to reach victims, she says, and hospitals "are overwhelmed" as hundreds of injured people arrive at the same time.

The Rafah crossing into Egypt is closed today, she says, affecting patients waiting to evacuate Gaza to seek treatment.

We're now hearing from the families of Israeli hostages being held in Gaza.

"The greatest fear of the families, the kidnapped, and the citizens of Israel has come true," says a statement from the Hostages and Missing Families Forum.

"The Israeli government chose to give up the hostages."

The statement expresses shock and anger at what it calls the "deliberate dismantling of the process to return our loved ones".

It says Israel and Hamas "must return to the ceasefire" and calls on US President Donald Trump, who has pledged to end the war, to "continue to act as he has declared and acted so far".

Israel has said 59 hostages are still being held in Gaza, with up to 24 believed to be alive.

This morning, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu's office said today's air strikes were a response to Hamas's "repeated refusal to release our hostages", and to Hamas's "rejection of all the proposals" to extend the ceasefire.

Image source, The Hostages and Missing Families Forum / Paulina Patimer

As we have been reporting, Israel's military has recently issued fresh evacuation orders for multiple areas in Gaza.

With strikes continuing, many are fleeing to areas they consider safer. Israel has advised Gazans to head to Khan Younis in the south, or western areas of Gaza City.

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Getty Images

Rosalia Bollen, UN children's charity Unicef spokesperson, is in Al-Mawasi in southern Gaza.

"It was a tough night for everyone," she tells BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

She woke up to the sound "of very very loud explosions, our guest house was shaking. For the next 15 minutes... we heard explosions almost every five / six seconds."

She describes hearing yelling and sirens outside, as the rumbling of planes flew continued overhead.

"These bombings have been preceded by a total blockage on supplies, humanitarian goods, fuel, cooking gas, and the cutting off of electricity to a Unicef supported water desalination plant," she says.

"Healthcare has been decimated throughout 15 months of war," Bollen says.

Children she has spoken to are "deeply scarred and traumatised" from the war, and the strikes need to stop, she says.

"Where is this truce?" Kamal Abu Al-Atta asks, after strikes hit his accommodation in the Shejaiya area, near Gaza City.

"Look here and see how much killed people we have - we have nearly 100 martyrs here, that's not acceptable, that's not a truce at all, enough is enough," he tells the Reuters news agency.

Another man, Mohammed Bdeir, says his daughter was killed by the Israeli strikes.

"We were sleeping, then suddenly woke up on the strike, they hit our neighbours...we found this girl beneath the rubble, we pulled her mother and father from under the rubble."

They eventually found his daughter's body underneath the rubble, he says.

Image source, Reuters

We've just had a statement from the UN Humanitarian Coordinator for the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Muhannad Hadi, in response to the airstrikes across Gaza.

"This is unconscionable. A ceasefire must be reinstated immediately," Hadi says.

"People in Gaza have endured unimaginable suffering."

Image source, Reuters

Our Gaza correspondent recently reported that strikes are ongoing in Gaza this morning - and the Israel Defence Forces have just issued new evacuation orders, suggesting strikes will continue further.

The entire border of the Gaza Strip is now a red, dangerous zone, and people are being told to leave the areas of Beit Hanoun, Khuza'a, and Abasan al-Kabira and al-Jadida.

They should move to shelters in western Gaza City and Khan Younis "immediately", an IDF spokesperson says on X.

Image source, IDF

Jon Donnison
Reporting from Sderot, northern Israel

In the Israeli town of Sderot, looking out over northern Gaza in the early morning sunshine, the sound of explosions rumble in the distance.

There are also bursts of heavy machine gun fire and fighter jets in the sky. Israelis living close to the border woke to the news that the war could be back on.

"I am happy," 38-year old-Inbal, who works in a nearby restaurant, tells me. "Every day we don’t have the war, Hamas is preparing to attack us again."

She says she used to have many Palestinian friends, including from Gaza. "Not any more," she says, "they betrayed us."

She is one of many Israelis who would welcome a return to war.

Image source, Reuters

It has just turned 07:00 in London and 09:00 in Gaza. If you're just joining us, here's a timeline of what happened overnight:

• At just after 02:15 local time (00:15 GMT), the BBC reported Israeli warplanes had launched dozens of airstrikes across the Gaza Strip
• The Israel Defense Forces and Israel Security Agency announced just before 02:30 local time that they were "conducting extensive strikes" on Hamas "terror targets" in Gaza
• About 15 minutes later, the Palestinian Civil Emergency Service said Israel had carried out at least 35 airstrikes, and that at least 15 people had been killed and dozens injured
• Around 03:00 local time (01:00 GMT), the Israeli prime minister's office said the IDF had been instructed to take "strong action" against Hamas, following the group's "refusal to release our hostages" and its rejection of proposals received from the US "and from the mediators". "Israel will, from now on, act against Hamas with increasing military strength," it said
• At 03:20 (01:20 GMT), Hamas released a statement describing the attacks as "treacherous" and saying the Israeli government had decided to overturn the ceasefire - "exposing the prisoners in Gaza to an unknown fate"
• Around 20 minutes later, an Israeli official said the IDF was striking dozens of targets "based on Hamas readiness to execute terror attacks, build up force and re-arm"
• Just before 04:00 (02:00 GMT), reports emerged that the highest-ranking Hamas security official in the territory, Mahmoud Abu Watfa, had been killed
• Around 08:00 local time, the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry said the death toll from the Israeli strike overnight had risen to "at least 330"

Image source, EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock

Israel's Defence Minister Israel Katz says they will keep fighting in Gaza for "as long as the hostages are not returned and all our war aims are not achieved".

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu previously said the main aim of the war in Gaza was to "destroy" Hamas's military strength, as well as getting the hostages back.

We are starting to see pictures of the destruction caused by overnight strikes on Gaza, as the number killed passes 300:

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Getty Images

The Israeli government gave the White House notice before launching the strikes, an Israeli official tells the BBC’s US partner CBS.

Rushdi Abualouf
Gaza correspondent, reporting from Cairo

The latest figure from the Hamas-run health ministry says more than 300 people have been killed in these strikes.

Officials have been trying to collect information from five hospitals around the Gaza Strip.

More than 50 children and 28 women are among those killed in the strikes that targeted several areas across the region.

The last hour or so has seen relative calm in Gaza, but in hospitals doctors say they have received more than 250 people injured.

Some are in a very critical condition, and they are trying to cope with a lack of facilities and medical equipment.

The intensity of the air strikes are less now than when they started around 02:00 local time, but are still going on.

Most of the people at this time were up to prepare the pre-dawn Ramadan meal, so they would have been awake at the time of the attacks.

Since the ceasefire, people were living in tents but at least they weren't living in fear, up until the shocking news last night.

The Hamas-run Gaza health ministry says the death toll from the Israeli strike overnight has risen to "at least 330".

The AFP news agency quotes the head of the ministry, Mohammed Zaqut, who says most of the dead are women and children.

He adds hundreds more are wounded, "dozens of them in critical condition".

Yolande Knell
Middle East correspondent, in Jerusalem

Two months of relative calm in Gaza rapidly ended overnight.

Israel said it was hitting dozens of Hamas targets with officials suggesting that the operation was open-ended and expected to expand.

“Israel will, from now on, act against Hamas with increasing military strength,” the prime minister’s office said.

Senior Hamas security and political figures are reportedly among the dead – but doctors say many children were also killed in the air strikes.

Hamas warned that what it called Israel’s “unprovoked escalation” had unilaterally breached the ceasefire and put the fate of hostages in jeopardy.

With the backing of the US, Israel has been pushing for the return of hostages in exchange for a longer-term truce and allowing aid back into Gaza.

Hamas has insisted on talks about a permanent end to the war and full Israeli troop withdrawal from Gaza in line with the terms of the original ceasefire deal.

The White House said it was consulted by Israel about these latest attacks and that instead of a new agreement, Hamas had chosen "refusal and war".

Image source, Getty Images

We're now starting to hear accounts from Gaza, where at least 220 Palestinians have reportedly been killed in Israeli strikes.

Mohammed Jarghoun, 36, was sleeping in a tent near his destroyed house in Khan Younis when he was woken by huge blasts.

"I thought they were dreams and nightmares, but I saw a fire in my relatives' house. More than 20 martyrs and wounded, most of them children and women," he told the AFP news agency.

Ramez Alammarin, 25, described carrying children to hospital southeast of Gaza City.

"They unleashed the fire of hell again on Gaza," he said of Israel, adding that "bodies and limbs are on the ground, and the wounded cannot find any doctor to treat them".

"They bombed a building in the area and there are still martyrs and wounded under the rubble... fear and terror," he told AFP.

"Death is better than life."

Mahmoud Abu Watfa, the deputy interior minister in Gaza and the highest-ranking Hamas security official in the territory, has reportedly been killed in a strike.

He can be seen below, the man with grey hair on the centre right, alongside Hamas security chief Tawfiq Abu Naim in 2020.

Image source, Reuters

Rushdi Abualouf
Gaza correspondent, reporting from Cairo

It started as a normal night in Gaza, with many people having their pre-dawn meal due to it being the holy month of Ramadan.

Then explosions started.

They were first heard in northwest Gaza. Witnesses say artillery fire came first, then more than 20 Israeli war planes flew over Gaza. They very quickly began to hit targets in Gaza City, Rafah and Khan Younis.

This is the biggest wave of airstrikes since 19 January, when the ceasefire came into effect.

Two days ago, talks in Doha which lasted for 72 hours and involved high level officials from Egypt, Qatar and the US failed to extend the first stage of the ceasefire, or move into the second phase.

Everyone was then expecting an escalation.

I was talking to a senior Hamas official last night, who said they had declared a state of emergency in Gaza. Hamas was expecting some type of Israeli air strike.

But for the people in Gaza, it was a surprise.

Image source, Getty Images

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it was targeting what it called "terror targets" belonging to Hamas.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister Israel Katz ordered the strikes on Tuesday morning, according to a statement from the PM's office.

"This follows Hamas's repeated refusal to release our hostages, as well as its rejection of all of the proposals it has received from US Presidential Envoy Steve Witkoff and from the mediators," it said.

"Israel will, from now on, act against Hamas with increasing military strength," it added.

The plan for the strikes "was presented by the IDF over the weekend and approved by the political leadership", it said.

Israel's Ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, warned Hamas to release all the hostages, stating "we will show no mercy on our enemies".

Hamas has responded furiously, accusing Israel of treachery for overturning the ceasefire agreement. It also says Israel is exposing the remaining Israeli hostages held in Gaza to "an unknown fate".

But Hamas has not yet declared that it is resuming the war, instead calling on mediators and the United Nations to intervene.

Image source, Reuters

The Israeli military says it has carried out "extensive strikes" in the Gaza Strip overnight.

At least 220 people have been killed, the Hamas-run health ministry has said.

One of those reportedly killed was Mahmoud Abu Watfa, the highest-ranking Hamas security official in Gaza. But many civilians, including children, have also been caught up in the attack.

This is the largest wave of airstrikes in Gaza since the ceasefire began on 19 January. Talks to extend the Gaza ceasefire have failed to reach an agreement.

Stay with us while we keep you updated.