Israel at war day 640
- Trump: ‘Good chance’ of deal this week that would see ‘quite a few hostages’ released
- White House Middle East Envoy Steve Witkoff will travel to Doha later this week to join the negotiations on the hostage deal.
-The talks for a deal continue in Qatar; meanwhile, the disputes between the parties outweigh the agreements. A source close to Netanyahu: "If the US does not increase the pressure, we might reach a situation where there will be no deal this week." Kan 11
- Lufthansa airline group says it is preparing to gradually resume its flight operations to and from Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion airport starting August 1.
- For the first time ever, the IDF operated a “Shadow General Staff” during the war with Iran, out of concern that IDF chief Eyal Zamir and other generals may be attacked.
- Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich: 35,000 pro-Iranian militia fighters in Iraq planned to infiltrate Israel through Jordan as part of Iran’s extermination plan.
- Relatives of hostages and scores of protesters are gathered outside the US embassy branch in Tel Aviv rallying for a ceasefire deal ahead of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s meeting with US President Donald Trump at the White House.
- Defense Minister Israel Katz instructed the IDF to bring forward a plan to establish a new “humanitarian city” in the southern Gaza Strip, on the ruins of Rafah. The idea of the humanitarian area, according to Katz, is to accommodate initially some 600,000 Palestinians displaced from elsewhere in the Strip
- Iran’s president claims Israel tried to kill him, In interview with Tucker Carlson, Masoud Pezeshkian says Israel tried to bomb area where he was holding meeting.
