Thank you for following our coverage of the latest developments in the Gaza-Israel war - we will close this page shortly.

This is what happened today:

• The Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza has said 22,438 people have now been killed in Gaza since the Hamas attacks on Israel on 7 October
• The ministry also said that 14 people were killed in a blast at al-Mawasi, near Khan Younis

• Al-Mawasi is a narrow strip of land in the south of the Gaza Strip which has few buildings and largely consists of sandy dunes and agricultural land. It was designated a safe zone by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) last year, though humanitarian agencies criticised the choice
• The IDF has announced it has killed Mamdouh Lolo, a senior member of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ)
• In Lebanon, the funeral of assassinated deputy Hamas leader Saleh al-Arouri has taken place. Our Middle East correspondent Hugo Bachega said that many Lebanese citizens are now wondering how the killing will affect their country - read more from Hugo here.

There are concrete fears that this conflict is expanding. Yemen's Houthis are defiant after several countries warned them not to continue their Red Sea attacks, while over in Lebanon Hezbollah has said that the death of Hamas Saleh al-Arouri "won't go unpunished".

If you would like to remind yourselves of the roots of this conflict, do read our explainer here: What is Hamas and why is it fighting with Israel in Gaza?

Today's coverage was brought to you by our teams in Jerusalem and London, thank you for joining us.

Hugo Bachega
Middle East correspondent, in Beirut

Image source, EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock

At the funeral of Saleh al-Arouri, the deputy Hamas leader assassinated in Beirut two days ago, crowds carried banners with his picture and waved the group's green flag through the streets amid the sound of music, prayers and heavy gunfire.

Across Lebanon, many watched the procession on TV, wondering how the killing would affect their country.

Al-Arouri's assassination was a blow for Hamas, but it also hit its ally Hezbollah, the powerful Iranian-backed Lebanese movement, as it struck Dahiyeh, a suburb of the city that is a stronghold of the group.

This raised fears of a wider conflict in the region but both Hezbollah and Israel appear to be indicating they want to avoid a major confrontation, at least for now.

In Tel Aviv, Defence Minister Yoav Gallant reaffirmed his country’s determination to change the security situation in northern Israel, to allow the return of residents evacuated due to Hezbollah’s constant attacks.

There was a “short window of time for diplomatic understandings, which we prefer”, he said, as he met US envoy Amos Hochstein.

This came a day after a speech by Hassan Nasrallah, the influential Hezbollah leader, who described al-Arouri's killing as a “flagrant Israeli aggression” but, crucially, gave no open threats to act against Israel.

Nasrallah, who is expected to address his supporters again on Friday, needs to be seen to be giving a response to the attack in Beirut.

But any reaction is likely to be calibrated to avoid a strong retaliation from Israel - and the potential of another catastrophic conflict for Lebanon.

• Read more on this from Hugo Bachega

Liz Sly, a journalist and former Middle East correspondent for the Washington Post, spoke to BBC News about the potential dangers if this conflict widens.

Sly says there are "four fronts [that are] quite active right now", which makes it one of "the most precarious moment we've seen since October 7 for the region".

She says those four fronts are:

• The assassination in Lebanon of Hamas deputy leader Saleh al-Arouri, who she says was "instrumental in linking Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran in a sort of axis".
• Attacks by Houthi rebels on shipping in the Red Sea.
• Warning by the US, UK and 10 other countries that there would be severe consequences if these attacks continue.

• And a deputy commander of an Iraqi militia being assassinated in Baghdad today, "in the heart of the city in a drone strike". Sly says it has not been confirmed that the United States was behind the killing.

"The potential for things to spin out of control is there," she says.

Asked about Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu's stance, she says "the situation on the northern front with Hezbollah is alarming for Israel... and they might feel that this is the time to take out Hezbollah as well as Hamas, and go for broke".

"We are in uncharted territory and I think it is quite hard to tell what the Israeli motives are right now," Sly adds.

On 25 December, Netanyahu said Israel will intensify its fight against Hamas, and that Israel's military campaign in Gaza was "not close to being over".

The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) says an unnamed vessel has been boarded by five or six "unauthorised armed persons" about 460 nautical miles east of Eyl in Somalia.

The crew are reported to be taking refuge in the ship's secure space known as a citadel.

This would be the 25th attack on commercial shipping in the area since mid-November.

UKMTO is a body of the UK's Ministry of Defence which coordinates between commercial shipping and the military.

The attack comes after the US, UK and 10 other states warned Houthi rebels in Yemen that they will face consequences if they continue to attack commercial shipping in the Red Sea.

Image source, PA Media

UK Foreign Secretary David Cameron has warned Israel it must allow more humanitarian aid into Gaza to avoid starvation and large outbreaks of disease.

Speaking while visiting Kosovo, Cameron said he was worried about people getting ill and going hungry, adding:

He also touched on the current situation in the Red Sea, where Houthi rebels from Yemen - who've declared support for Hamas - have been attacking commercial shipping.

Earlier, in a joint statement, the US, UK and 10 other states warned the Houthis they'd face consequences if they continued.

When asked, Cameron declined to specify what action Britain would take.

"This is illegal. It's not to do with Gaza, it's not to do with Israel. This is about the freedom of navigation. This is about the ability of ships to carry their cargo."

Image source, EPA

The UN's human rights chief Volker Turk is the latest figure to criticise comments made by two of Israel's far-right ministers, who called for Palestinians to emigrate from Gaza.

Turk said he was "very disturbed" by the statements. Earlier, Saudi Arabia’s foreign ministry called them "extremist remarks" and said it condemned them.

At the weekend, finance minister Bezalel Smotrich called for Palestinians to leave Gaza and make way for Israelis who could "make the desert bloom". Then on Monday, national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir called for "a solution to encourage the emigration of Gaza's residents" and the re-establishment of Israeli settlements in the Gaza Strip.

The comments have also been criticised by several countries including the US and France, while EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said it was "inflammatory and irresponsible".

The official line from the Israeli government is that Gazans will eventually be able to return to their homes, though it has yet to outline how or when this will be possible.

Israel's defence minister, Yoav Gallant, has told US special envoy Amos Hochstein that there is a "short" window of time for a diplomatic solution with Lebanon's Hezbollah.

“We find ourselves at a junction - there is a short window of time for diplomatic understandings,” Gallant said during the meeting in Tel Aviv, according to an Israeli government press statement.

“We will not tolerate the threats posed by the Iranian proxy, Hezbollah, and we will ensure the security of our citizens.”

Gallant also said Israel is determined to change the security situation in northern Israel, and along the border with Lebanon.

Hochstein is in Israel as part of moves to prevent a larger escalation along the northern border.

He previously mediated a maritime border agreement between Israel and Lebanon.

As we've been reporting, the Hamas-run health ministry says 14 people - including nine children - have been killed in an Israeli strike in Al-Mawasi, west of Khan Younis in Gaza's south.

Al-Mawasi is a narrow strip of land which has few buildings and largely consists of sandy dunes and agricultural land.

It was designated a safe zone by the Israel Defense Forces last year, though humanitarian agencies said it was too small and lacking in infrastructure for them to be able to support displaced people effectively there.

The IDF has said that on 6 December Hamas "launched a rocket from a humanitarian zone toward Israel", and released a map with al-Mawasi marked.

The BBC has not been able to independently verify this.

More on al-Mawasi here.

Shaimaa Khalil
BBC correspondent in Ramallah

As we've been reporting, the funeral of Hamas deputy leader, Saleh al-Arouri is under way in Lebanon.

However, he is originally from here in the occupied West Bank. His hometown of Aroura is not far from where I am reporting from.

There is a service there during his funeral and burial in Beirut.

His house in Aroura was destroyed by the Israeli army after the 7 October attacks.

People protesting in Ramallah for the last two days say they see Arouri as a figure of the resistance - though despite chanting his name, many of the protesters say they are there to back "the resistance" rather than any faction or group.

“Ours is a message of freedom we are a civilised, educated people who love the other who want to coexist", one of the protesters here in Ramallah, Hesham Abu Raya, tells me.

He said the people here feel abandoned. "Some rights could only be obtained through resistance after we’ve been let down by the leaders."

Hamas has continued firing rockets into Israel. They’ve been adamant that there will be no deal to release more hostages unless there is a complete ceasefire - a proposition that is out of the question for Israel.

After the killing of Arouri, Arab media reported that Egypt has suspended its mediation efforts.

The Israel Defense Forces has put out a statement on X, external, formerly Twitter, announcing that it killed Mamdouh Lolo, a senior member of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), in an airstrike, in a joint operation with Shin Bet, Israel's domestic intelligence agency.

According to the IDF, Lulu "served as an assistant to the heads of the PIJ in the northern region of the Gaza Strip" and was a "central figure" in the PIJ, "who planned and lead many terrorist attacks from the Gaza Strip against Israeli civilians and soldiers".

A leading academic from a foreign affairs think-tank tells the BBC she believes Iran and Hezbollah do not want to get "embroiled" in a direct conflict with Israel or the West.

Barbara Slavin, a distinguished fellow at the Stimson Center in Washington, says Iran is making vague threats of "severe retaliation" over the Gaza-Israel conflict but nothing specific.

Slavin puts this down to Iran "piggybacking off the struggle of the Palestinians" and wanting to benefit from the fallout of the 7 October attacks by Hamas on Israel.

Referring to the bomb blasts which killed 84 people in Iran on Wednesday, Slavin says whilst the culprits are still unknown, she suspects Iran will continue to blame Israel or the US in "some form or fashion".

The US has already said it had no indication that Israel was involved and dismissed any suggestion that Washington was involved.

Slavin says Iran has embraced the Palestinan cause to exploit tensions but adds:

"On the other hand the Israelis cannot expect that Iran will be able to solve the Palestinian issue for them... even if Iran were to stop its support for Hamas, I'm sure Palestinians would continue to resist and protest occupation by Israel."

The Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza has just published its latest death toll in the Palestinian territory.

Posting on the Telegram platform it says 22,438 people have now been killed in Gaza since the Hamas attacks on Israel on 7 October.

It says 125 people have been killed and 318 injured in the past 24 hours, with the total number of people injured now 57,614. It adds that 70% of the casualties are women and children.

The BBC is not able to verify the numbers, but international agencies say they have no reason to disbelieve casualty figures released by the health ministry in Gaza.

Read more: How the dead are counted in Gaza

Image source, Getty Images

The head of Israel's Mossad intelligence agency has said it "is committed to settling the score with the murderers" who carried out the Hamas attack.

David Barnea said on Wednesday evening: "It will take time, just like after the Munich massacre, but we will lay our hands on them wherever they will be".

The Munich massacre took place in 1972 when Israeli Olympic athletes in Germany were attacked by the Palestinian militant group Black September.

"Every Arab mother ought to know that if her son participated, directly or indirectly, in the slaughter of 7 October, his blood shall be upon his own head," Barnea added.

The funeral of Hamas's deputy leader, Saleh al-Arouri, is now taking place in Beirut.

Arouri's assassination in a drone strike on Tuesday has raised fears that Israel's war with Hamas could spiral into a wider regional conflict.

Israel has neither confirmed nor denied responsibility for the killing.

Mourners carrying Hamas flags gathered to join the procession.

Here are some images from the scene:

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Reuters

Image source, Reuters

It's coming up to 15:45 in Gaza and Israel, and 13:45 here in our London newsroom. Here are the main developments so far today:

• Gaza's Hamas-run health ministry says at least 14 people were killed in an Israeli bombing in al-Mawasi in southern Gaza - an area Israel had previously designated as a safe zone
• The Palestinian Red Crescent charity says its headquarters in Khan Younis has been hit in an Israeli strike, with one person killed and six others injured
• In Lebanon, the funeral of assassinated deputy Hamas leader Saleh al-Arouri is getting under way in the capital Beirut
• The Iran-backed Hezbollah group has said four more of its members have been killed in an Israeli air strike in the village of Naqoura in Lebanon
• US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is set to travel to the Middle East later - his fourth visit since 7 October

• Global concerns about the regional spill over of the war in Gaza remain high

• The UN Security Council says the attacks by Iran-backed Houthis on ships in the Red Sea threaten regional stability, freedom of navigation and global food supplies. The Houthis, who control much of Yemen, have been targeting ships in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden with missiles or drones

We're hearing more now from people in al-Mawasi, which, as we mentioned in our last post, is a small area on the southern coast of Gaza where a blast has reportedly killed at least 14 Palestinians - and which Israel has previously promoted as a safe area.

One man describes being asleep in a camp of tents when the blast occurred - he says he later found a body that "flew 40 metres away" as a result of the explosion.

"Where is the humanity?" Jamal Hamad Salah says to Reuters, asking: "Where is the European democracy and the Muslim community, where are the Arabs and where are the Muslims?"

Mahmoud Saleh, the uncle of one of those killed in the attack, expresses anger at the international community for not doing enough:

And Bahaa Abu Hatab, whose brother died in the blast, adds that nowhere in Gaza is safe. "Wherever you go, there are strikes," he tells the news agency. "In the country, next to the camps, in al-Mawasi. There is no safe space."

The Israeli military says it is targeting Hamas fighters, not civilians. The BBC has approached it for comment on this incident.

Image source, Reuters

We reported earlier that 14 people, including nine children, had been killed in a blast west of Khan Younis, according to the Hamas-run health ministry - and there's some more detail now.

Health officials in Gaza say the blasts were in al-Mawasi and were the result of Israeli airstrikes.

The Israeli military hasn't commented on this specific incident, but we've gone to them for comment.

Al-Mawasi, an 8.5 sq km (3.3 sq mile) strip of land by the Mediterranean Sea, was designated safe by the Israeli military last month. Millions of Palestinians had been told to flee for safety to the area, which is smaller than London's Heathrow Airport.

Nahed Abu Taime, a doctor at the Nasser hospital in southern Khan Younis, where the dead and wounded were taken, tells Reuters they received the bodies of 16 people, "some of whom were residents from al-Mawasi area". "53 injured people [have] arrived since midnight," he adds.

• You can read more about al-Mawasi here

Shaimaa Khalil
BBC correspondent in Ramallah

The anger is palpable on the streets of Ramallah in the occupied West Bank.

The killing of Saleh al-Arouri may have removed a significant name from both Israel’s and the US’s target list. A man they have long accused of being responsible for many terror activities.

But the people here tell me they lost a senior figure of the resistance.

“Saleh al-Arouri was not just a regular person he was an exceptional leader, a freedom fighter, an intellectual and we have so much respect for him," Hala Abu Gharbia tells me as she carries a Palestinian flag.

She has come out for many protests since the beginning of the war in Gaza, but says this time there’s a new sense of loss. “We feel great deal of rage, of fury and piercing sadness.”

Since Israel’s war with Hamas in Gaza, protesters have gathered regularly here at Al-Manara roundabout in the city centre.

But it feels different this time. Almost all the shops in this bustling area were shut yesterday after the call for a general strike.

The voices on the streets were that of protesters chanting Arouri’s name. Chanting for freedom, resistance and calling for revenge. Some protesters were waving Palestinian flags, a couple of others carried green Hamas flags.

The assassination of Hamas's deputy leader, Saleh al-Arouri, has been seen as a pivotal moment precisely because he's the most senior member of the group to have been killed since Israel went to war with it after 7 October.

The 57-year-old was deputy chairman of Hamas's political bureau and the founding commander of the Al-Qassam Brigades, the group's military wing.

Arouri joined Hamas in 1987, leading the Islamic student movement and helping establish the group's military presence in the West Bank.

He had been based in Lebanon prior to his death, acting as a connection between his group and Hezbollah. More here.