The United Nations’ humanitarian chief on Saturday assessed the enormous challenge of restoring essential services across the war-ravaged Gaza Strip, as Israel received the remains of another hostage from the October 7 attack, marking the second week of the ceasefire.

In a small convoy of white UN vehicles, relief coordinator Tom Fletcher and his team navigated through the wreckage of demolished buildings to inspect a wastewater treatment facility in Sheikh Radwan, north of Gaza City.

“I drove through here seven or eight months ago when most of these buildings were still standing. To see this level of destruction vast stretches of the city turned into wasteland it’s absolutely heartbreaking,” Fletcher told AFP.

Once densely populated with over two million Palestinians, Gaza’s cities now lie in ruins after two years of relentless bombardment and fierce clashes between Hamas and the Israeli army.

A little over a week after U.S. President Donald Trump helped broker the truce, the main border crossing with Egypt remains closed, though hundreds of aid trucks continue to enter daily through Israeli checkpoints to distribute relief supplies.

Hamas has returned the last 20 living hostages in its custody and has begun transferring the remains of 28 others who died during captivity.

On Friday night, it handed over the body of Eliyahu Margalit, 75, who was killed in the October 2023 attack that triggered the Gaza war.

Digging latrines

Surveying the damaged pumping equipment and a grim lake of sewage at the Sheikh Radwan wastewater plant, Fletcher said the task ahead for the UN and aid agencies was a “massive, massive job”.

The British diplomat said he had met residents returning to destroyed homes trying to dig latrines in the ruins.

“They’re telling me most of all they want dignity,” he said. “We’ve got to get the power back on so we can start to get the sanitation system back in place.

“We have a massive 60 day plan now to surge in food, get a million meals out there a day, start to rebuild the health sector, bring in tents for the winter, get hundreds of thousands of kids back into school.”

According to figures supplied to mediators by the Israeli military’s civil affairs agency and released by the UN humanitarian office, on Thursday some 950 trucks carrying aid and commercial supplies crossed into Gaza from Israel.

Relief agencies have called for the Rafah border crossing from Egypt to be reopened to speed the flow of food, fuel and medicines, and Turkey has a team of rescue specialists waiting at the border to help find bodies in the rubble.
– Hostage remains –
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu approved the ceasefire but is under pressure at home to restrict access to Gaza until the remaining bodies of the hostages taken during Hamas’s brutal attacks have been returned.

On Saturday, his office confirmed that the latest body, returned by Hamas via the Red Cross on Friday night, had been identified as Margalit, the elderly farmer who was known to his friends at the Nir Oz kibbutz as “Churchill”.

“He was a cowboy at heart, and for many years managed the cattle branch and the horse stables of Nir Oz,” said the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, a support group founded by relatives of the hostages.

“He was connected to the ‘Riders of the South’ group whose members shared a love of horseback riding for over 50 years. On October 7, he went out to feed his beloved horses and was kidnapped from the stable.”

Margalit had been married with three children and three grandchildren. His daughter Nili Margalit, also taken hostage, was freed during the war’s first brief truce in November 2023.

In a statement confirming he had been identified and his remains returned to his family, Netanyahu’s office said “we will not compromise … and will spare no effort until we return all of the fallen abductees, down to the last one”.

Hamas spokesman Hazem Qassem said on Friday that the group “continues to uphold its commitment to the ceasefire agreement… and it will continue working to complete the full prisoner exchange process”.

Under the ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas, negotiated by Trump and regional mediators, the Palestinian militant group has returned all 20 surviving hostages and the remains of 10 out of 28 deceased ones.

US President Donald Trump described the ongoing Afghanistan-Pakistan conflict as “an easy one” for him to resolve, emphasizing his pride in saving lives and preventing wars.

Speaking at a joint press conference with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in Washington on Saturday, Trump said, “This is pretty much the last one, although I understand Pakistan is involved in an attack with Afghanistan.

That’s an easy one for me to solve if I have to. In the meantime, I have to run the USA, but I love solving wars.”

Trump highlighted his track record, saying, “I like stopping people from being killed. I’ve saved millions and millions of lives, and I think we’re going to have success with this war.”

He also referenced Pakistan’s Prime Minister, noting that his mediation during the recent Pakistan-India conflict saved tens of millions of lives, avoiding a confrontation between two nuclear-armed nations.

Trump added that he has helped defuse eight global conflicts in the past eight months, including Pakistan-India tensions and the Gaza conflict, asserting, “All of these wars had nothing to do with us, but I saved tens of millions of lives.”

Last week, Trump had said that he was aware of the escalating tensions between Pakistan and Afghanistan, claiming he would address the situation once he returned from the Middle East, as he described himself as “good at solving wars.”

“This (Gaza) will be my eighth war that I have solved, and I hear there is a war now going on between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

I said, I’ll have to wait till I get back. I am doing another one. Because I am good at solving wars,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One as he began a flight from Washington to Israel.

The US president’s statement came as Islamabad and Kabul mutually agreed to extend the temporary truce until the conclusion of planned talks in Doha.

• I think we’re going to be fine with China, says US president.
• US Treasury secretary speaks with Chinese vice premier.
• World Trade Organisation urges US, China to ease tensions.
  

US President Donald Trump said his proposed 100% tariff on goods from China would not be sustainable, but blamed Beijing for the latest impasse in trade talks that began with Chinese authorities tightening control over rare-earth exports.

Asked whether such a high tariff was sustainable and what that might do to the US economy, Trump replied: “It’s not sustainable, but that’s what the number is.”

“They forced me to do that,” he said in an interview with Fox Business Network that was broadcast on Friday.

Trump unveiled additional levies of 100% on imports of Chinese goods a week ago, along with new export controls on “any and all critical software” by November 1, nine days before existing tariff relief was set to expire.

The new trade actions were Trump’s reaction to China’s dramatic expansion of its export controls on rare earth elements. China dominates the market for such elements, which are essential to tech manufacturing.

Trump also confirmed he would meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping in two weeks in South Korea and expressed admiration for the Chinese leader.

“I think we’re going to be fine with China, but we have to have a fair deal. It’s got to be fair,” Trump said on FBN’s “Mornings with Maria,” which was taped on Thursday.

Later, as he was preparing to have lunch at the White House with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to discuss efforts to end its war with Russia, Trump said: “China wants to talk, and we like talking to China.”

The softening in tone and affirmation of his intent to meet with Xi helped stem Wall Street’s early losses on Friday. Major US stock indexes, which have been rattled over the last week by Trump’s abrupt re-imposition of steep levies on Chinese imports and by credit worries among regional banks, were up in afternoon trading.

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent spoke with his counterpart, Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng, on Friday evening in what he called “frank and detailed discussions” about trade, and said the two will meet in person next week.

WTO urges de-escalation of trade spats

The head of the World Trade Organisation said she urged the US and China to de-escalate trade tensions, warning that a decoupling by the world’s two largest economies could reduce global economic output by 7% over the longer term.

WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala told Reuters in an interview the global trade body was extremely concerned about the latest spike in US-China trade tensions and had spoken with officials from both countries to encourage more dialogue.

But tensions continued to run high, even as Trump and Xi prepared to meet.

Bessent took aim at China’s state-driven economic practices in a statement to the IMF’s steering committee on Friday, urging the IMF and World Bank to take a tougher stance on China’s external and internal balances and industrial policies that US officials say have helped China build up excess manufacturing capacity that is flooding the world with cheap goods.

And China’s Commerce Ministry on Friday accused the US of undermining the rules-based multilateral trading system since the Trump administration took office in 2025, vowing to intensify its use of dispute settlement actions at the WTO.

It also urged the US to roll back measures that breach non-discrimination rules and align its industrial and security policies with WTO obligations.

Bessent earlier in the week had accused one of He’s top aides of being “unhinged” in recent interactions with US trade negotiators. China said on Friday that Bessent’s remarks “seriously distort the facts.”