Middle East conflict live updates: Hamas says it will continue cease-fire negotiations

The babies of 5,500 women who are due to give birth in the next month in Gaza are at risk of dying, the U.N. agency for children, UNICEF, reported. Mothers do not have access to prenatal or postnatal checkups because of bombings, it said. Anxiety is also leading to premature births.

Benny Gantz, a member of Israel’s war cabinet and a political rival of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, met with Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Senate Majority Leader Schumer during his U.S. visit, which will be followed by a trip to the United Kingdom. Austin requested Gantz’s support for increasing humanitarian shipments to the Gaza Strip, according to a Pentagon readout.

Blinken on Tuesday expressed concern about a potential environmental disaster in the Red Sea, mentioning a cargo ship that sank after it was struck by a missile launched by Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen. That ship, the Rubymar, has been spilling oil and fertilizer into the sea, according to U.S. Central Command.

At least 30,631 people have been killed and 72,043 injured in Gaza since the war began, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants. Israel estimates that about 1,200 people were killed in Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack and says 246 soldiers have been killed since the start of its military operation in Gaza.