By MELANIE LIDMAN, SAM METZ and SAMY MAGDY, Associated Press

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israel’s military said Wednesday it would call up tens of thousands of reservists and extend the service of others for an expanded military operation in Gaza City.

Defense Minister Israel Katz approved plans to begin a new phase of operations in some of Gaza’s most densely populated areas, Israel’s military said Wednesday. The scheme, expected to receive the final approval from the chief of staff in the coming days, includes calling up 60,000 reservists and extending the service of an additional 20,000 currently serving.

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In a country of fewer than 10 million people, the call-up of so many reservists carries both economic and political weight and comes days after hundreds of thousands rallied for a ceasefire.

This comes as negotiators scramble to bring Israel and Hamas to agree to a ceasefire ending 22 months of fighting, while international leaders and rights groups warn an expanded assault could deepen Gaza’s humanitarian crisis, with most residents displaced, neighborhoods in ruins, and communities facing the threat of famine.

A military official, speaking on the condition of anonymity in line with military regulations, said that troops will operate in parts of Gaza City where they have not yet been deployed and where Israel believes Hamas is still active. Israeli troops in the Zeitoun and Jabaliya — a built-up refugee camp in Gaza City — are already preparing the groundwork for the expanded operation.

Gaza City is both Hamas’ military and governing stronghold and one of the last places of refuge in northern Gaza, where hundreds of thousands are sheltering. Israeli troops will be targeting Hamas’ vast underground tunnel network there, the official added.

Although Israel has targeted and killed much of Hamas’ senior leadership, parts of the militant group are actively regrouping and carrying out attacks, including launching rockets towards Israel, the official said.

Gaza City operation could begin within days

It remains unclear when the operation will begin, but it could be a matter of days and such a mobilization of reservists is the largest in months.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said the objective of the war is to secure the release of remaining hostages and ensure Hamas and other militants can never again threaten Israel.

The planned offensive, first announced earlier this month, comes amid heightened international condemnation of Israel’s restrictions on food and medicine reaching Gaza and fears of another mass displacement among Palestinians.

AP journalists saw small groups heading south from the city this week, but how many will voluntarily flee remains unclear. Some said they were waiting to see how events unfold before moving yet again, and many insist nowhere is safe from airstrikes.

“What we’re seeing in Gaza is nothing short of apocalyptic reality for children, for their families, and for this generation,” Ahmed Alhendawi, regional director of Save the Children, said in an interview. “The plight and the struggle of this generation of Gaza is beyond being described in words.”

Exhausted reservists question war’s goals

The call-up comes as a growing campaign of exhausted reservists accuses the government of perpetuating the war for political reasons and failing to bring home remaining hostages.

The families of the hostages and former army and intelligence chiefs have also expressed opposition to the expanded operation in Gaza City. Most of the families of the hostages want an immediate ceasefire and worry an expanded assault could imperil bringing the 50 hostages still in Gaza home. Israel believes that 20 are still alive.

Guy Poran, a retired air force pilot who has organized veterans campaigning to end the war, said many reservists are exhausted after repeated tours lasting hundreds of days and resentful of those not called up at all. Most now just want to return to their lives.

“Even those that are not ideologically against the current war or the government’s new plans don’t want to go because of fatigue or their families or their businesses,” he said.

Hamas’ terrorist attack Israel on Oct. 7, 2023 started the war, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting 251. Most of the hostages have been released in ceasefires or other deals. Hamas says it will only free the rest in exchange for a lasting ceasefire and an Israeli withdrawal.

Israel still to respond to ceasefire proposal accepted by Hamas

Arab mediators and Hamas said this week the leaders of the Palestinian militant group had agreed to ceasefire terms, though similar announcements have been made in the past that did not lead to a lasting truce.

Egypt and Qatar have said they have been waiting for Israel’s response to the ceasefire proposal. “The ball is now in Israel’s court,” Egyptian Foreign Minister Bader Abdelattay said Tuesday.

An Israeli official who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media said Israel is in constant contact with the mediators in an effort to secure the release of the hostages.

Netanyahu has repeatedly said he will oppose a deal that doesn’t include the “complete defeat of Hamas.”

More than 62,122 people have been killed during Israel’s 22-month offensive, Gaza’s Health Ministry said on Monday. The ministry is part of the Hamas-run government and staffed by medical professionals. The ministry does not say how many of the dead were civilians or combatants, but says women and children make up around half of them.

In addition to that toll, 154 adults have died of malnutrition-related causes since late June, when the ministry began counting such deaths, and 112 children have died of malnutrition-related causes since the war began.

Far-right Israeli minister shares more prison footage

Israel’s far-right national security minister on Wednesday released footage of Israeli prisons showing images of Gaza’s destruction to Palestinian inmates.

A video posted on Telegram by National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir shows him pointing to an image of Palestinians walking amid rubble and half-collapsed buildings, saying they were being shown to security prisoners.

“So they understand that the people of Israel are not messing around,” he wrote.

Ben-Gvir’s prison visit comes amid a string of provocative moves. It’s less than a week after he published a video of himself admonishing an imprisoned Palestinian leader in a face-to-face meeting inside a prison, saying Israel will confront anyone who acts against the country and “wipe them out.”

Two and a half weeks ago, he visited Jerusalem’s most visited and prayed at Jerusalem’s most sensitive holy site, triggering regional condemnation and fears that the provocative move could further escalate tensions.

Netanyahu’s government depends on backing from the far-right, which opposes negotiations for a phased ceasefire in Gaza. Ben-Gvir said Monday that Netanyahu didn’t have a mandate to pursue such a truce.

The far-right bloc nabbed a victory on Wednesday when Israel gave final approval for a controversial settlement project east of Jerusalem in the occupied West Bank. The development in what’s called E1 would effectively cut the territory in two, and Palestinians and rights groups say it could destroy hopes for a future Palestinian state.

Israel says it killed Hamas militant involved in abduction of father whose family was taken hostage

Israel’s military said Wednesday it had killed a Hamas militant who stormed a kibbutz and abducted Yarden Bibas, the father of three whose wife and two young children were also kidnapped on Oct. 7.

The Bibas family became one of Israel’s most closely followed hostage cases after body camera footage of the mother and her young children being abducted was circulated widely in Israel and abroad. The three were later killed during the war, while Yarden was released.

In a statement, Bibas called the killing of his alleged kidnapper “a small part of my closure” and said he was still awaiting the return of hostages held in Gaza. __ Lidman and Magdy reported from Tel Aviv, Israel and Cairo.

By JOHN HANNA, SARA CLINE and JIM VERTUNO, Associated Press

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Democratic state Rep. Nicole Collier refused to come to the Texas state Capitol for two weeks. Now she won’t leave, and fellow Democrats are joining her protest.

Collier was among dozens of Democrats who left the state for the Democratic havens of California, Illinois, Massachusetts and New York to delay the Republican-controlled Legislature’s approval of redrawn congressional districts sought by President Donald Trump. When they returned Monday, Republicans insisted that Democrats have around-the-clock police escorts to ensure they wouldn’t leave again and scuttle Wednesday’s planned House vote on a new political map.

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But Collier wouldn’t sign what Democrats called the “permission slip” needed to leave the House chamber, a half-page form allowing Department of Public Safety troopers to follow them. She spent Monday night and Tuesday on the House floor, where she set up a livestream while her Democratic colleagues outside had plainclothes officers following them to their offices and homes.

Dallas-area Rep. Linda Garcia said she drove three hours home from Austin with an officer following her. When she went grocery shopping, he went down every aisle with her, pretending to shop, she said. As she spoke to The Associated Press by phone, two unmarked cars with officers inside were parked outside her home.

“It’s a weird feeling,” she said. “The only way to explain the entire process is: It’s like I’m in a movie.”

The trooper assignments, ordered by Republican House Speaker Dustin Burrows, was another escalation of a redistricting battle that has widened across the country. Trump is pushing GOP state officials to tilt the map for the 2026 midterms more in his favor to preserve the GOP’s slim House majority, and Democrats nationally have rallied around efforts to retaliate.

Other Democrats join the protest

House Minority Leader Gene Wu, from Houston, and state Rep. Vincel Perez, of El Paso, stayed overnight with Collier, who represents a minority-majority district in Fort Worth.

On Tuesday, more Democrats returned to the Capitol to tear up the slips they had signed and stay on the House floor, which has a lounge and restrooms for members.

Dallas-area Rep. Cassandra Garcia Hernandez, called their protest a “slumber party for democracy” and said Democrats were holding strategy sessions on the floor.

“We are not criminals,” Houston Rep. Penny Morales Shaw said.

Collier said having officers shadow her was an attack on her dignity and an attempt to control her movements.

Republican leader says Collier ‘is well within her rights’

Burrows brushed off Collier’s protest, saying he was focused on important issues, such as providing property tax relief and responding to last month’s deadly floods. His statement Tuesday morning did not mention redistricting and his office did not immediately respond to other Democrats joining Collier.

“Rep. Collier’s choice to stay and not sign the permission slip is well within her rights under the House Rules,” Burrows said.

Under those rules, until Wednesday’s scheduled vote, the chamber’s doors are locked, and no member can leave “without the written permission of the speaker.”

To do business Wednesday, 100 of 150 House members must be present.

The GOP wants 5 more seats in Texas

The GOP plan is designed to send five additional Republicans from Texas to the U.S. House. Texas Democrats returned to Austin after Democrats in California launched an effort to redraw their state’s districts to take five seats from Republicans.

Democrats also said they were returning because they expect to challenge the new maps in court.

Republicans issued civil arrest warrants to bring the Democrats back after they left the state Aug. 3, and Republican Gov. Greg Abbott asked the state Supreme Court to oust Wu and several other Democrats from office. The lawmakers also face a fine of $500 for every day they were absent.

How officers shadowed Democratic lawmakers

Democrats reported different levels of monitoring. Houston Rep. Armando Walle said he wasn’t sure where his police escort was, but there was still a heightened police presence in the Capitol, so he felt he was being monitored closely.

Some Democrats said the officers watching them were friendly. But Austin Rep. Sheryl Cole said in a social media post that when she went on her morning walk Tuesday, the officer following her lost her on the trail, got angry and threatened to arrest her.

Garcia said her 9-year-old son was with her as she drove home, and each time she looked in the rearview mirror, she could see the officer close behind. He came inside a grocery store where she shopped with her son.

“I would imagine that this is the way it feels when you’re potentially shoplifting and someone is assessing whether you’re going to steal,” she said.

Hanna reported from Topeka, Kansas, and Cline reported from Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

By MATTHEW BROWN and HANNAH SCHOENBAUM, Associated Press

A Yosemite National Park ranger was fired after hanging a pride flag from El Capitan while some park visitors could face prosecution under protest restrictions that have been tightened under President Donald Trump.

Shannon “SJ” Joslin, a ranger and biologist who studies bats, said they hung a 66-foot wide transgender pride flag on the famous climbing wall that looms over the California park’s main thoroughfare for about two hours on May 20 before taking it down voluntarily. A termination letter they received last week accused Joslin of “failing to demonstrate acceptable conduct” in their capacity as a biologist and cited the May incident.

Yosemite visitors view El Capitan, where a transgender flag hangs in Yosemite National Park, Calif., May 20, 2025. (Jayce Kolinski via AP)

“I was really hurting because there were a lot of policies coming from the current administration that target trans people, and I’m nonbinary,” Joslin, 35, told The Associated Press, adding that hanging the flag was their way of saying, “We’re all safe in national parks.”

Joslin said their firing sends the opposite message: “If you’re a federal worker and you have any kind of identity that doesn’t agree with this current administration, then you must be silent, or you will be eliminated.”

Park officials on Tuesday said they were working with the U.S. Justice Department to pursue visitors and workers who violated restrictions on demonstrations at the park that had more than 4 million visitors last year.

The agencies “are pursuing administrative action against several Yosemite National Park employees and possible criminal charges against several park visitors who are alleged to have violated federal laws and regulations related to demonstrations,” National Park Service spokesperson Rachel Pawlitz said.

Joslin said a group of seven climbers including two other park rangers hung the flag. The other rangers are on administrative leave pending an investigation, Joslin said.

A group of people, including Shannon Joslin, a Yosemite National Park ranger and biologist who was fired, hang a transgender flag on El Capitan in Yosemite National Park, Calif., May 20, 2025. (Mitchell Overton via AP)

Flags have long been flown from El Capitan without consequences, said Joanna Citron Day, a former federal attorney who is now with the advocacy group Public Employees For Environmental Responsibility. She said the group is representing Joslin, but there is no pending legal case.

On May 21, a day after the flag display, Acting Superintendent Ray McPadden signed a rule prohibiting people from hanging banners, flags or signs larger than 15 square feet in park areas designated as “wilderness” or “potential wilderness.” That covers 94% of the park, according to Yosemite’s website.

Park officials said the new restriction was needed to preserve Yosemite’s wilderness and protect climbers.

“We take the protection of the park’s resources and the experience of our visitors very seriously, and will not tolerate violations of laws and regulations that impact those resources and experiences,” Pawlitz said.

It followed a widely publicized instance in February of demonstrators hanging an upside down American flag on El Capitan to protest the firing of National Park Service employees by the Trump administration.

Among the climbers who helped hang the transgender flag was Pattie Gonia, an environmentalist and drag queen who uses the performance art to raise awareness of conservation issues. For the past five years, Gonia has helped throw a Pride event in Yosemite for park employees.

She said they hung the transgender flag on the iconic granite monolith to express that being transgender is natural.

This year, Trump signed an executive order changing the federal definition of sex to exclude the concept of gender identity. He also banned trans women from competing in women’s sports, removed trans people from the military and limited access to gender-affirming care.

Gonia called the firing unjust. Joslin said they hung the flag in their free time, as a private citizen.

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“SJ is a respected pillar within the Yosemite community, a tireless volunteer who consistently goes above and beyond,” Gonia said.

Jayson O’Neill with the advocacy group Save Our Parks said Joslin’s firing appears aimed at deterring park employees from expressing their views as the Trump administration pursues broad cuts to the federal workforce.

Since Trump took office, the National Park Service has lost approximately 2,500 employees from a workforce that had about 10,000 people, Wade said. The Republican president is proposing a $900 million cut to the agency’s budget next year.

Pawlitz said numerous visitors complained about unauthorized demonstrations on El Capitan earlier in the year.

Many parks have designated “First Amendment areas” where groups 25 or fewer people can protest without permits. Yosemite has several of those areas, including one in Yosemite Valley, where El Capitan is located.

Park service rules on demonstrations have existed for decades and withstood several court challenges, said Bill Wade, executive director of the Association of National Park Rangers. He was not aware of any changes in how those rules are enforced under Trump.

Associated Press journalist Brittany Peterson contributed reporting from Denver.

By GABRIELA AOUN ANGUEIRA, Associated Press

If a major hurricane approaches Central Florida this season, Maria knows it’s dangerous to stay inside her wooden, trailer-like home. In past storms, she evacuated to her sister’s sturdier house. If she couldn’t get there, a shelter set up at the local high school served as a refuge if needed.

But with aggressively accelerating detentions and deportations of immigrants across her community of Apopka, 20 miles northwest of Orlando, Maria, an agricultural worker from Mexico without permanent U.S. legal status, doesn’t know if those options are safe. All risk encountering immigration enforcement agents.

“They can go where they want,” said Maria, 50, who insisted The Associated Press not use her last name for fear of detention. “There is no limit.”

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Natural disasters have long posed singular risks for people in the United States without permanent legal status. But with the arrival of peak Atlantic hurricane season, immigrants and their advocates say President Donald Trump’s militaristic immigration enforcement agenda has increased the danger.

Places considered neutral spaces by immigrants such as schools, hospitals and emergency management agencies are now suspect, and agreements by local law enforcement to collaborate with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement make them more vulnerable, choosing between physical safety or avoiding detention.

“Am I going to risk the storm or risk endangering my family at the shelter?” said Dominique O’Connor, an organizer at the Farmworker Association of Florida. “You’re going to meet enforcement either way.”

For O’Connor and for many immigrants, it’s about storms. But people without permanent legal status could face these decisions anywhere that extreme heat, wildfires or other severe weather could necessitate evacuating, getting supplies or even seeking medical care.

Federal and state agencies have said little on whether immigration enforcement would be suspended in a disaster. It wouldn’t make much difference to Maria: “With all we’ve lived, we’ve lost trust.”

New policies deepen concerns

Efforts by Trump’s Republican administration to exponentially expand immigration enforcement capacity mean many of the agencies active in disaster response are increasingly entangled in immigration enforcement.

Since January, hundreds of law enforcement agencies have signed 287(g) agreements, allowing them to perform certain immigration enforcement actions. Most of the agreements are in hurricane-prone Florida and Texas.

This GOES-19 GeoColor satellite image taken Tuesday, Aug. 19, 2025 at 1:20 p.m. EDT and provided by NOAA, shows Hurricane Erin churning slowly toward the eastern U.S. coast. (NOAA via AP)

Florida’s Division of Emergency Management oversees building the state’s new detention facilities, like the one called “Alligator Alcatraz” in the Everglades. Federal Emergency Management Agency funds are being used to build additional detention centers around the country, and the Department of Homeland Security temporarily reassigned some FEMA staff to assist ICE.

The National Guard, often seen passing out food and water after disasters, has been activated to support U.S. Customs and Border Protection operations and help at detention centers.

These dual roles can make for an intimidating scene during a disaster. After floods in July, more than 2,100 personnel from 20 state agencies aided the far-reaching response effort in Central Texas, along with CBP officers. Police controlled entry into hard-hit areas. Texas Department of Public Safety and private security officers staffed entrances to disaster recovery centers set up by FEMA.

That unsettled even families with permanent legal status, said Rae Cardenas, executive director of Doyle Community Center in Kerrville, Texas. Cardenas helped coordinate with the Mexican Consulate in San Antonio to replace documents for people who lived behind police checkpoints.

“Some families are afraid to go get their mail because their legal documents were washed away,” Cardenas said.

In Florida, these policies could make people unwilling to drive evacuation roads. Traffic stops are a frequent tool of detention, and Florida passed a law in February criminalizing entry into the state by those without legal status, though a judge temporarily blocked it.

There may be fewer places to evacuate now that public shelters, often guarded by police or requiring ID to enter, are no longer considered “protected areas” by DHS. The agency in January rescinded a policy of President Joe Biden, a Democrat, to avoid enforcement in places like schools, medical facilities and emergency response sites.

The fears extend even into disaster recovery. On top of meeting law enforcement at FEMA recovery centers, mixed-status households that qualify for help from the agency might hesitate to apply for fear of their information being accessed by other agencies, said Esmeralda Ledezma, communications associate with the Houston-based nonprofit Woori Juntos. “Even if you have the right to federal aid, you’re afraid to be punished for it,” Ledezma said.

In past emergencies, DHS has put out messaging stating it would suspend immigration enforcement. The agency’s policy now is unclear.

DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in an email that CBP had not issued any guidance “because there have been no natural disasters affecting border enforcement.” She did not address what directions were given during CBP’s activation in the Texas floods or whether ICE would be active during a disaster.

Florida’s Division of Emergency Management did not respond to questions related to its policies toward people without legal status. Texas’ Division of Emergency Management referred The Associated Press to Republican Gov. Greg Abbott’s office, which did not respond.

Building local resilience is a priority

In spite of the crackdown, local officials in some hurricane-prone areas are expanding outreach to immigrant populations. “We are trying to move forward with business as usual,” said Gracia Fernandez, language access coordinator for Alachua County in Central Florida.

The county launched a program last year to translate and distribute emergency communications in Spanish, Haitian Creole and other languages. Now staffers want to spread the word that county shelters won’t require IDs, but since they’re public spaces, Fernandez acknowledged there’s not much they can do if ICE comes.

“There is still a risk,” she said. “But we will try our best to help people feel safe.”

As immigrant communities are pushed deeper into the shadows, more responsibility falls on nonprofits, and communities themselves, to keep each other safe.

Hope Community Center in Apopka has pushed local officials to commit to not requiring IDs at shelters and sandbag distribution points. During an evacuation, the facility becomes an alternative shelter and a command center, from which staffers translate and send out emergency communications in multiple languages. For those who won’t leave their homes, staffers do door-to-door wellness checks, delivering food and water.

“It’s a very grassroots, underground operation,” said Felipe Sousa Lazaballet, the center’s executive director.

Felipe Sousa Lazaballet, executive director of the Hope Community Center walks through an area that can be set up for feeding families if they were to encounter a disaster Thursday, Aug. 14, 2025, in Apopka, Fla. (AP Photo/John Raoux)

Preparing the community is challenging when it’s consumed by the daily crises wrought by detentions and deportations, Sousa Lazaballet said.

“All of us are in triage mode,” he said. “Every day there is an emergency, so the community is not necessarily thinking about hurricane season yet. That’s why we have to have a plan.”

Associated Press coverage of philanthropy and nonprofits receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content. For all of the AP’s philanthropy coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/philanthropy.