Israel-Gaza live updates: France, UK, Canada recognize Palestinian statehood

The Palestinian Foreign Ministry urged "exceptional and urgent international intervention to protect civilians in Gaza City" as the Israel Defense Forces launched a major offensive operation there overnight.

"The failure of international diplomacy to stop the war is suspicious and unjustified," the ministry said in a post to X on Tuesday morning.

The ministry accused the Israeli government of a "deliberate targeting of civilians, turning Gaza City into a mass graveyard and an uninhabitable land, as is the case with the broader area of the sector, and pushing nearly a million Palestinians into displacement and movement within a tight circle of death."

The ministry, which is based in the West Bank, called on foreign powers to "ensure an immediate cessation of the war and aggression, the protection of civilians, the prevention of their displacement from the sector, the immediate release of hostages and prisoners and the sustainable delivery of aid."

Israel's action in the Gaza Strip amount to a genocide, a United Nations commission said in a report released on Tuesday, a finding that an Israeli ministry rejected as "fake."

The Independent International Commission of Inquiry, which operates under the U.N Human Rights Council, also wrote in a 72-page report that it found that some "statements made by Israeli authorities are direct evidence of genocidal intent."

"Additionally, on the basis of circumstantial evidence, the Commission finds that genocidal intent was the only reasonable inference that could be drawn based on the pattern of conduct of the Israeli authorities," the report said.

It added, "Thus, the Commission concludes that the Israeli authorities and Israeli security forces have the genocidal intent to destroy, in whole or in part, the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip."

The Israeli Foreign Ministry in a statement sought to reject the assertions, saying the authors of the report amounted to "Hamas proxies."

"The report relies entirely on Hamas falsehoods, laundered and repeated by others," the ministry said in part in a post on social media on Tuesday.

The report was researched and written by the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, which was formed by the Human Right Council in 2021, as an independent investigative body.

The commission's findings are independent of the proceedings at the International Court of Justice, which would be tasked with making "a final determination in the future on Israel's responsibility under the Genocide Convention," the report said.

-ABC News' Somayeh Malekian, Jordana Miller and Kevin Shalvey

The Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry said in a post to Telegram on Tuesday that at least 59 people were killed and 386 people injured in the previous 24 hours, during which time Israel Defense Forces units began their offensive on Gaza City.

Three of the deaths recorded in the previous 24 hours were a result of malnutrition, the ministry said. A total of 428 people have died from malnutrition, the ministry said.

The ministry did not specify where in the strip the recent deaths occurred.

At least 64,964 people have been killed and 165,312 people injured since the conflict began on Oct. 7, 2023, the ministry said.

"Gaza is burning," Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said in a post to X on Tuesday as the Israel Defense Forces began its offensive on the largest city in the Gaza Strip.

"The IDF strikes with an iron fist at the terrorist infrastructure and IDF soldiers are fighting bravely to create the conditions for the release of the hostages and the defeat of Hamas," Katz wrote.

"We will not relent and we will not go back -- until the completion of the mission," he added.

Video footage from the area showed multiple large explosions in Gaza City on Tuesday as the IDF pressed its offensive.