TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — Five Israeli soldiers were killed in an attack in Gaza, the Israeli military said Tuesday, while health officials in the Palestinian territory said 18 people were killed in Israeli strikes.

The bloodshed came as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was visiting the White House for talks with U.S. President Donald Trump about a ceasefire plan to pause the Gaza fighting. While there was no announcement of a breakthrough, there were signs of progress toward a deal.

The killings of the soldiers could add to the pressure on Netanyahu to strike a deal in Israel, where polls have shown widespread support for ending the war.

Soldiers attacked with explosive devices

An Israeli security official said explosive devices were detonated against the soldiers during an operation in the Beit Hanoun area in northern Gaza, which was an early target of the war and an area where Israel has repeatedly fought regrouping militants.

Militants also opened fire on the forces who were evacuating the wounded soldiers, the official said. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to discuss the incident with the media.

The military said 14 soldiers were wounded in the attack, two of them seriously. It brings the toll of soldiers killed to 888 since the war against Hamas began in 2023.

Abu Obeida, the spokesperson for Hamas’ armed wing, said on Telegram that its fighters’ operation in Beit Hanoun was an “additional blow” against what he described as a “weak” army in an area he said the Israeli military thought was safe. He added that “the most foolish decision Netanyahu could make would be to keep his forces inside the Gaza Strip.”

The soldiers were killed roughly two weeks after Israel reported one of its deadliest days in months in Gaza, when seven soldiers were killed after a Palestinian attacker attached a bomb to their armored vehicle.

In a statement, Netanyahu sent his condolences for the deaths, saying the soldiers fell “in a campaign to defeat Hamas and to free all of our hostages.”

Israeli strikes in southern and central Gaza

Health officials at the Nasser Hospital, where victims of the Israeli strikes were taken, said one of the strikes targeted tents sheltering displaced people in Khan Younis in southern Gaza, killing four people. A separate strike in Khan Younis killed four people, including a mother, father, and their two children, officials said.

In central Gaza, Israeli strikes hit a group of people, killing 10 people and injuring 72 others, according to a statement by Awda Hospital in Nuseirat.

The Israeli military had no immediate comment on the strikes, but it blames Hamas for any harm to civilians, saying the militant group operates out of populated areas.

The fighting has pushed the health care system in Gaza close to collapse. On Tuesday, the Palestine Red Crescent said the Al-Zaytoun Medical Clinic in Gaza City ceased operations after shelling in the surrounding area. It said the closure would force thousands of civilians to walk long distances to get medical care or obtain vaccinations for children.

Hopes for a ceasefire agreement soon

Trump has made clear that, following last month’s 12-day war between Israel and Iran, he would like to see the 21-month Gaza conflict end soon. Netanyahu’s visit to Washington may give new urgency to the ceasefire proposal.

White House officials are urging both sides to quickly seal an agreement that would bring about a 60-day pause in the fighting, send aid flooding into Gaza and free at least some of the remaining 50 hostages held in the territory, 20 of whom are believed to be living.

A senior Israeli official said that 80-90% of the details had been ironed out and that a final agreement could be days away. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to discuss the sensitive negotiations with the media.

A sticking point has been whether the ceasefire will end the war altogether. Hamas has said it is willing to free all the hostages in exchange for an end to the war and a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza. Netanyahu says the war will end once Hamas surrenders, disarms and goes into exile — something it refuses to do.

The war began when Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 others hostage. Most have been released in earlier ceasefires. Israel responded with an offensive that has killed over 57,000 Palestinians, more than half of them women and children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.

The ministry, which is under Gaza’s Hamas government, does not differentiate between civilians and combatants. The U.N. and other international organizations see its figures as the most reliable statistics on war casualties.

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Khaled reported from Cairo and Shurafa from Deir al-Balah, Gaza Strip.

A pediatrician for a chain of clinics affiliated with a prominent Houston hospital system is “no longer employed” there, according to officials, after a social media account associated with her published a post wishing the “Maga” voters of a Donald Trump-supporting county in Texas to “get what they voted for” amid flash flooding that killed more than 100 people, including many children.

“We were made aware of a social media comment from one of our physicians,” read a statement from Blue Fish Pediatrics circulated late Sunday. “The individual is no longer employed by Blue Fish Pediatrics.”

The statement also said: “We strongly condemn the comments that were made in that post. That post does not reflect the values, standards or mission of Blue Fish Pediatrics. We do not support or condone any statement that politicizes tragedy, diminishes human dignity, or fails to clearly uphold compassion for every child and family, regardless of background or beliefs.”

Blue Fish Pediatrics’ statement neither named the physician in question nor specified whether she had resigned or was dismissed. But multiple publicly accessible social media posts identified her as Dr Christina Propst. A Guardian source familiar with the situation confirmed the accuracy of the posts naming Propst. And, at the time it issued the statement, Blue Fish Pediatrics had recently unpublished Propst’s biographical page from its website.

Attempts to contact Propst weren’t immediately successful.

The post attributed to Propst prompted many – including on social media – to pressure Blue Fish Pediatrics to take action against her. For one, while they are entitled to the same constitutional free speech rights everyone else in the country is, many US healthcare providers are required by their employers to avoid publicizing opinions which could undermine trust in their profession among members of the public.

But the timing of the post also caused offense, coming after communities along Texas’s Guadalupe River were overwhelmed early Friday from flash flooding triggered by torrential rain. The river rose 26ft (8 meters) in 45 minutes after 1.8tn gallons of rain fell over a region including Kerr county, Texas, about 286 miles (460km ) west of Texas.

As of Monday, officials were reporting more than 90 people had died – with others missing – during the flood. Many of those reported dead were in Kerr county. And many were children, including some who were attending Camp Mystic, a 99-year-old, all-girls, nondenominational Christian institution.

In the post that preceded the end of her time at Blue Fish Pediatrics, Propst alluded to how Kerr county had – like Texas as a whole – voted in favor of Trump as he defeated former vice-president Kamala Harris in November’s White House election. Trump’s administration has since eliminated mentions of the ongoing climate crisis and its consequences, one of which is downpours like the one that devastated Kerr becoming more common. He has also mused about “phasing out” the Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema), in part so that the president’s office could be in charge of distributing disaster relief funds and ultimately “give out less money”.

“May all visitors, children, non-Maga voters and pets be safe and dry,” said the post, which invoked an acronym for Trump’s “Make America great again” slogan. “Kerr county Maga voted to gut Fema. They deny climate change. May they get what they voted for.”

The post concluded with the phrase: “Bless their hearts,” which in the US south is often used as a condescending insult.

Kerr county residents who survived the flood have since spoken about losing all of their possessions, including their homes. They have also recounted seeking what have proven to be elusive answers about the level of preparedness from authorities in charge of protecting their communities.

In short order, the post made its way to Blue Fish Pediatrics, which is described as an independent partner of Houston’s well-known Memorial Hermann hospital network. The clinic chain – which was tagged by users demanding that it act against Propst – said in a statement that the group was immediately placing the message’s author on leave. A subsequent statement indicated that the post’s author was no longer an employee of the chain while expressing “full support to the families and the surrounding communities who are grieving, recovering and searching for hope”.

Meanwhile, a statement from Memorial Hermann said that the post’s author was not directly employed by the network. The statement, though, made it a point to say, “We … strongly condemn these statements … [and] we have zero tolerance for such rhetoric which does not reflect the mission, vision or values of our system.”

Propst’s unpublished biography described her as a native of New York who graduated from Princeton University in 1991. She later graduated from New Orleans’s Tulane medical school, received certifications from the American board and academy of pediatrics and spent 17 years in group practice in Houston before joining Blue Fish in 2018.

According to the unpublished biography, Propst was voted “best pediatrician” in numerous reader polls conducted by Houston’s Bellaire Examiner newspaper.

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), formerly known as food stamps, helps one in eight Americans put food on the table, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP). SNAP is a lifeline for many individuals, families and people with disabilities.

More than 62% of SNAP recipients are part of families with children. In 2022, 20% of children under 18 nationwide were in families receiving SNAP benefits. More than 38% of SNAP recipients are from working families. And more than 37% of families receiving SNAP include someone who is disabled or elderly, according to the CBPP.

“Without SNAP, families miss meals. Kids show up to school hungry. Parents skip groceries to keep the lights on. We’re not talking about convenience. We’re talking about survival,” Erica Williams, executive director of the nonprofit A Red Circle and co-author of the peer-reviewed food policy brief Food Pricing and Consumer Choice, tells Yahoo. SNAP is crucial because “it’s the most direct tool we have to reduce hunger,” she says. Most of the families Williams works with tell her that they don’t want to be on SNAP forever but need help while they “get stable,” she points out.

SNAP can be used to buy a variety of foods, including dairy products, meat, poultry, fish, fruits and vegetables and snack foods. However, the program has limitations. “You can’t buy hot food or household goods like soap and diapers,” Williams says. “You also can’t buy prepared meals, which means parents working two jobs can’t just grab something healthy on the go. It reinforces exhaustion.”

Although SNAP helps many people get by when they don’t earn enough to buy groceries, it often isn’t enough. Rising food costs and eligibility restrictions make it challenging for many SNAP recipients to meet their needs. Yahoo talked to five people about what being on SNAP is really like.

‘We’re both trying. But we’re still hungry.’

Danielle, a single mother in Missouri, works full-time in administrative support. She started receiving SNAP benefits when her son Marcus, now 20, was a baby, and his father stopped paying child support.

Today, Danielle works 40 hours a week and still receives SNAP benefits. Marcus, who is neurodivergent, lives at home while he takes classes at a community college and works about 15 hours a week. Yet, despite having two working adults in the house, Danielle and Marcus don’t earn enough to feed themselves adequately.

Danielle’s SNAP benefits help, but they are still struggling. Marcus stopped receiving benefits when he turned 18 because he was in school full-time and wasn’t working enough hours to qualify for SNAP. Now, Danielle has to feed herself and her son with SNAP benefits meant for one adult. “I understand the rules,” Danielle tells Yahoo. However, she emphasizes that she’s unwilling to let her son go hungry or drop out of school and have a chance at a more financially stable life. “That means I skip meals so he doesn’t have to,” she says.

Danielle usually buys foods like dry pasta, rice and canned vegetables to stretch her grocery budget. Eggs are a rare luxury, and she relies on a nonprofit food bank for fresh produce. Most of Danielle and Marcus’s diet is “Heavy. Salty,” Marcus says. “You feel full, then you crash. I get foggy. Slow. Food’s supposed to be medicine,” Marcus tells Yahoo. However, his limited diet often makes him feel worse. “We’re both trying. But we’re still hungry,” Danielle says.

Danielle wants people to know that “this isn’t about laziness. It’s not about people gaming the system. It’s about working families, caregiving parents, students trying to get out and still falling short.”

‘SNAP is not charity. It’s a stabilizing force.’

Like Danielle, Jessica is also a single mother living in Missouri. She’s been on and off SNAP since 2012. She typically buys items like flour, cereal, cheese and salmon with her SNAP benefits. Occasionally, she buys fresh fruit and vegetables and treats like ice cream or chicken nuggets for her son. However, due to the higher cost of fruit and vegetables, Jessica often finds that her benefits aren’t enough to support a healthy diet. To fill the gap, Jessica relies on nonprofits like A Red Circle. “The biggest challenge of being on SNAP is finding affordable quality food,” Jessica tells Yahoo.

Even though Jessica would like to feed her son a healthy diet, she laments that her SNAP benefits are often just enough to cover “pantry fillers.” Another challenge to staying healthy on SNAP is that “you can’t buy vitamins, medicine or supplements,” she says. That makes it harder to stay healthy in the long run, she explains.

Nevertheless, SNAP is a lifeline for Jessica. “Without SNAP, feeding my family would be incredibly hard. With the cost of living so high and wages so low, it would be a serious struggle,” she explains. “SNAP is not charity. It’s a stabilizing force,” she says.

‘I literally wouldn’t be surviving without SNAP’

Megan, who lives alone and has chronic Lyme disease and other tick-borne illnesses, worked as a public servant in New York for 24 years. For her entire career, she helped others in need, including people struggling with mental illness and families whose loved ones were placed in child or adult protective services.

Although Megan wanted to continue working, her health worsened, and she had to leave her job. Once Megan’s savings ran out, she relied on local food pantries for food. When that wasn’t enough, she applied for SNAP.

Megan still visits food pantries. However, she uses her SNAP benefits to “round out meals from the ingredients the food pantry provides,” she says. Since Megan usually gets canned and boxed goods from the food pantry, she usually uses her SNAP benefits to buy meat and produce. However, she notes that because of the high price of fresh fruit, produce “feels like a luxury.” Moreover, although Megan tries to cook everything from scratch to save money, she keeps one or two pre-prepared meals on hand to eat when her illness flares and she’s too fatigued to cook.

“I literally wouldn’t be surviving without SNAP,” Megan tells Yahoo. “Having SNAP has given me some peace of mind regarding access to food.” However, Megan is concerned because SNAP benefits don’t automatically increase when grocery prices go up. Due to rising grocery prices, “the SNAP benefits don’t stretch as far in covering what’s needed for a month,” she says.

Megan is doing what she can to help with her recovery, but doesn’t know when or if she will be able to return to work. “Every fiber of me just wants to have my prior level of functioning back,” she says. “I loved the work that I did. I loved my clients.”

She adds: “I’m hopeful that I will medically improve enough to be able to return to work and discontinue SNAP, but it will realistically be a few years, at best.” Until then, “SNAP is a lifeline for me,” Megan says.

‘I would have had a hard time paying for my essentials.’

Ryan Wilson, a disabled videographer from Colorado, was on SNAP for seven years. Like many people with disabilities, he had a hard time finding a job that paid him a living wage. “The job market was and is tough,” Wilson tells Yahoo.

When he wasn’t earning enough to cover his basic expenses, SNAP helped him get by. He told Yahoo that without SNAP, “I would have had a hard time paying for my essentials” like food and medical care.

However, Wilson emphasizes that SNAP helped him survive but not thrive. When he was on SNAP, he couldn’t use his benefits to buy necessities other than food. Additionally, he could only use his benefits at select locations like big box stores, even though smaller grocery stores were often closer. “That is an inconvenience, especially for someone with a disability that impacts their mobility,” Wilson says.

Now Wilson runs a video production company called Team Trust Productions. His income has increased, and he no longer needs SNAP to ensure he can access enough food. Wilson is grateful he received SNAP when he needed it, but he never expected to receive SNAP benefits forever. “It’s a temporary option. It does not have to be a permanent solution to financial uncertainty,” he says.

‘I would definitely not be eating three meals a day’

Although Laura, a single woman from Pennsylvania, worked full-time, her income wasn’t enough to support herself. For three years, Laura received SNAP benefits to help her get by. Eventually, she started earning a higher salary and no longer needed SNAP to buy food. However, in early 2025, Laura lost her job. Once her unemployment benefits ran out, she started receiving SNAP benefits again.

Without SNAP, “I would definitely not be eating three meals a day,” Laura tells Yahoo. She usually uses her SNAP benefits to buy frozen fruits and vegetables, chicken thighs and seasonal fruit and vegetables, which she finds more affordable than out-of-season produce. When she can afford it, Laura buys cheese and coffee. She also goes to her local food pantry to supplement her groceries. However, she emphasizes that food pantries are “meant to be just that — supplemental, not a source of regular groceries.”

Laura is grateful for the SNAP benefits she receives, but thinks some aspects of the program need to be changed. “I wish we could buy paper products,” she says. “Toilet paper is just as necessary as apples, and I wish I could just get everything at once.” She also wishes that restrictions on what SNAP recipients can buy, such as candy and hot foods, would be removed. Plus, Laura finds it difficult to figure out which foods she can buy with her benefits and which are excluded.

“No one should be told what food they’re allowed to buy. Food is a human right,” Laura says. “By making laws that just blindly eliminate whole sections of foods, that just makes it harder on people with specific diets. Or, it makes it impossible to give a little kid a birthday party,” she explains.

Most importantly, Laura wishes she could rely on SNAP being around for those who need it. She’s still looking for a full-time job that pays enough for her to support herself. Until then, however, “it’s always in the back of my mind that my access to food could be taken away at any time. Depending on a program that’s outside of your control, just to feed yourself, is terrifying,” she says.