From Lebanon, Palestinian Fatima al-Ashwah has been praying for relatives in Gaza, but received grim news that Israeli bombing killed around 12 of them days before a temporary truce between Israel and Hamas.

"They bombed their house," leaving some of them "in pieces," said Ashwah, drained by weeks of anguish and days of grief.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken will return this week to the Middle East as the U.S. hopes to find a way to extend a cease-fire in Gaza and get more hostages released, the State Department said Monday. It will be his third trip to the region since Israel's war with Hamas began last month.

Blinken will travel to Israel and the West Bank after attending Ukraine-focused meetings on Tuesday and Wednesday in Brussels and Skopje, North Macedonia, where foreign ministers from NATO and the Organization for Peace and Security in Europe are gathering.

A truce between Israel and Hamas entered its fifth day on Tuesday, with the militant group promising to release more civilian hostages to delay the expected resumption of the war and Israel under growing pressure to spare Palestinian civilians when the fighting resumes.

The sides agreed to extend their truce through Wednesday, with another two planned exchanges of militant-held hostages for Palestinians imprisoned by Israel. But Israel has repeatedly vowed to resume the war with "full force" to destroy Hamas once it's clear that no more hostages will be freed under the current agreement's terms.

The United States welcomed an agreement Monday to extend a truce between Israel and Hamas by two days, saying it was hopeful the humanitarian pause would continue for longer still.

A truce between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip will be extended by two days, the Palestinian group and mediator Qatar said Monday, opening the way for further releases of hostages and prisoners.

With just hours to go before the so-called "humanitarian pause" was to end early Tuesday, Hamas said that an agreement had been reached to prolong it by 48 hours under the existing terms.

The deal seemed on the verge of unraveling. Hamas had accused Israel of failing to keep its side of the bargain and Israel was threatening to resume its lethal onslaught on the Gaza Strip.

That was the point at which a Qatari jet landed at Israel's Ben-Gurion International Airport on Saturday. Negotiators aboard set to work, seeking to save the cease-fire deal between Israel and Gaza's Hamas rulers before it fell apart and scuttled weeks of high-stakes diplomatic wrangling.

Germany says it will provide financial support for the reconstruction of communities destroyed during Hamas' October 7 attack in southern Israel.

During a visit on Monday to Kibbutz Beeri, German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier said his country would provide 7 million euros ($7.6 million) for the kibbutz in 2024. The money is for reconstruction of a cultural center and a meeting center for senior citizens, German news agency dpa reported.

Elon Musk, who's been under fire over accusations of antisemitism flourishing on his social media platform X, paid a visit Monday to Israel, where he toured a kibbutz that was attacked last month by Hamas militants and was set to meet with top leaders.

The billionaire and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu toured the Kfar Azza kibbutz, which was stormed by Hamas militants on Oct. 7. Musk, wearing a protective vest and escorted by a phalanx of security personnel, used his phone to take photos or videos of the devastation, according to video released by Netanyahu's office.

Delegations from the European Union member states and Middle Eastern and north African countries are meeting Monday in Barcelona, Spain, to discuss the crisis in Gaza where a fragile pause in fighting is set to expire.

Forty-two delegations are scheduled to gather at the event hosted by the Union for the Mediterranean, with many represented by their foreign ministers. The meeting is chaired by the EU's foreign policy chief Josep Borrell and Jordan's Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi.

An Israeli airstrike Sunday hit the international airport in the Syrian capital of Damascus and put it out of commission, Syrian state media said.

Israel has struck Syria's Damascus and Aleppo international airports several times since the onset of the Hamas-Israel war in Gaza on Oct. 7. Israel has also struck parts of western Syria after rocket fire landed on the Israeli-occupied Syrian Golan Heights.