Tensions rose Monday at Columbia University, the epicenter of pro-Palestinian protests across US campuses, with college authorities and student demonstrators in open conflict after negotiations broke down.
Across the United States, police arrested around 275 people on four separate campuses over the weekend, with the White House calling on the growing protests in recent weeks to remain peaceful.
The World Central Kitchen nonprofit, which supplied meals in Gaza until seven of its aid workers were killed by an Israeli strike nearly a month ago, is to resume operations, its CEO said.
The US-based charity founded by celebrity Spanish-American chef Jose Andres provides food to communities facing humanitarian crises and disasters.
On the night of April 1, seven of its workers were killed in three air strikes over four minutes by an Israeli drone as they ran for their lives between their three vehicles, the Israeli military has said.
In a desert region of the occupied West Bank, Israeli activist Eyal Shani has fitted a tiny camera on his T-shirt to collect evidence of settler violence against Palestinian sheep farmers.
Campaigners like Shani have been trying to protect Palestinians from Jewish settlers in the rugged Masafer Yatta area south of Hebron, in the southern West Bank, but they say it has become increasingly difficult with attacks soaring following the outbreak of war in Gaza.
As garbage piles up and the heat rises in war-torn Gaza, flies and mosquitoes proliferate in crowded Rafah city and life becomes even more grim for displaced people living in tents.
Last week, temperatures already topped 30 degrees Celsius (86 degrees Fahrenheit), turning the makeshift shelters made from plastic tarps and sheets into sweltering ovens.
On a sliver of land on the outskirts of the far-southern city on the Egyptian border, about 20 of these tents have been erected, all shaded by a large sheet stretched above them.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Monday he was hopeful Hamas would accept an "extraordinarily generous" offer to halt Israel's Gaza offensive in return for the release of hostages.
"Hamas has before it a proposal that is extraordinarily, extraordinarily generous on the part of Israel," Blinken said in Riyadh at the World Economic Forum.
"In this moment, the only thing standing between the people of Gaza and a ceasefire is Hamas," he said.
The United States is nearly ready with a security package to offer Saudi Arabia if it normalises relations with Israel, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Monday, as he seeks incentives for Israel to support a Palestinian state.
Blinken was visiting the kingdom on his seventh trip to the region since the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel, which has responded with a relentless offensive in Gaza that has drawn global criticism.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived Monday in Riyadh at the start of a new crisis tour aimed at pushing an elusive Israel-Hamas ceasefire and increasing humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip.
The top US diplomat will also visit Jordan and Israel on his seventh visit to the region since the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel which set off a relentless Israeli military campaign in Gaza.
In Saudi Arabia, Blinken is expected to hold new talks with the Saudi leadership on potential normalisation of relations with Israel, a State Department official said.
Hopes rose on Monday for a long-sought-after truce and hostage release deal after almost seven months of war in Gaza between Palestinian Hamas militants and Israel.
Washington's top diplomat said he was "hopeful" Hamas would accept the offer, which his British counterpart said could see the release of thousands of Palestinian prisoners.
After meeting in Cairo, the Hamas delegation left Egypt and returned to Qatar "to discuss the ideas and the proposal... and we are keen to respond as quickly as possible," a Hamas source close to the talks told AFP on condition of anonymity.
The White House insisted Sunday that pro-Palestinian protests that have rocked US universities in recent weeks must remain peaceful, after police arrested around 275 people on four separate campuses over the weekend.
"We certainly respect the right of peaceful protests," National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told ABC's "This Week."
But, he added, "we absolutely condemn the anti-Semitism language that we've heard of late and certainly condemn all the hate speech and the threats of violence out there."
On a cinder block work table in the war-torn Gaza Strip, puppet maker Mahdi Karira is busy turning old tin cans into figurines.
He hums as he works, knowing his makeshift marionettes will put a smile on the faces of children displaced by the more than six-month war in the coastal Palestinian territory.
"These puppets can make things around us beautiful," he said, surveying his handiwork.
Before the war, Karira had a whole store of brightly-coloured puppets and often took them to perform in theatres.
