Two Palestinians killed in Israeli fire in West Bank

Civil defence personnel and relatives exhume graves at Al‑Ahli Arab Baptist Hospital to transfer the remains to official burial sites in Gaza City yesterday. Photo: AFP

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said yesterday that he will meet President Donald Trump later this month, saying a second phase of the US president's Gaza plan was close.

The meeting will discuss possible opportunities for peace and an end to the Palestinian group Hamas's rule in the enclave, he said during a joint press conference with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz.

Negotiations on the next stages of Trump's plan to end the two-year war in the Palestinian enclave have been continuing. The plan also included the release of Israeli hostages and the establishment of an interim technocratic Palestinian government in Gaza, overseen by an international "board of peace" and backed by an international security force.

"I will be having very important conversations at the end of the month on how to ensure the second phase will be achieved," Netanyahu added.

He also said that the first phase of Trump's plan was about to be finished.

Israel's military said yesterday that its forces killed two men in the occupied West Bank after what it described as an attempted ramming attack, with the Palestinian Authority identifying the deceased as a 17- and 55-year-old.

The Ramallah-based health ministry named the two victims as Ahmad Khalil Al-Rajabi, 17, and Ziad Jabara Abu Dawoud, 55, after the incident on Saturday night in the Bab al-Zawiya area in the city of Hebron.