ISRAELI forces have agreed to begin daily four-hour fighting pauses in northern Gaza, the United States government announced today.

US spokesperson John Kirby said that the Israelis had agreed to announce each pause at least three hours in advance.

But he confirmed that the US still did not support a ceasefire in Gaza.

The move, which falls well short of the ceasefire demanded by activists, comes after a leading rights organisation accused the Israeli authorities of holding thousands of Palestinians without charge or trial and then torturing them.

Meanwhile, Israeli troops were engaged in intense battles with Palestinian fighters including near to Shifa Hospital in the heart of Gaza City, where tens of thousands of people are sheltering alongside patients, according to the hospital’s general director Mohammed Abu Selmia.

The Israeli military says that Hamas’s main command centre is located in and under the hospital complex and that senior leaders are hiding there, using the facility as a shield. 

Hamas and hospital staff deny the claims and say the military is using this as an excuse to strike the facility.  

Scores of wounded people were rushed to Shifa overnight, Mr Selmia said today.

“At dawn, a shell landed very close to the hospital, but thank God only a few people had minor injuries,” he said.

Mr Selmia said: “The conditions here are disastrous in every sense of the word.

“We’re short on medicine and equipment, and the doctors and nurses are exhausted. We’re unable to do much for the patients.”

More than two-thirds of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million have fled their homes since the war began, with many heeding Israeli orders to flee to the southern part of the besieged enclave.

Amnesty International has slammed the Israeli authorities for detaining more than 2,000 Palestinians without charge or trial.

It also said on Wednesday that there was growing evidence of torture, with detainees stripped, beaten and humiliated.

Amnesty International’s Middle East and north Africa director Heba Morayef said: “Over the last month we have witnessed a significant spike in Israel’s use of administrative detention — detention without charge or trial that can be renewed indefinitely” — which was already at a 20-year high before the latest escalation in hostilities on October 7.

Since October 7, the Israeli authorities have detained more than 2,200 Palestinian men and women, according to the Palestinian Prisoners Club.

According to Israeli human rights organisation HaMoked, between October 1 and November 1, the overall number of Palestinians held without charge or trial in administrative detention has risen from 1,319 to 2,070.