[Source: Reuters]

Hamas battled Israeli troops on the outskirts of the Gaza Strip’s crowded southern city of Rafah on Wednesday and Washington said it had held up a shipment of powerful bombs to Israel to prevent Palestinian civilian casualties.

The United States, which aims to stave off a full Israeli invasion of Rafah, said it believes a revised Hamas ceasefire proposal may lead to a breakthrough in an impasse in negotiations, with talks resuming in Cairo on Wednesday.

Israeli tanks rolled into Gaza at the Rafah border crossing with Egypt on Tuesday, cutting off a vital aid route and the only exit for the evacuation of wounded patients.

A U.N. official said no fuel or aid had entered the Gaza Strip due to the military operation, a situation “disastrous for the humanitarian response” in Gaza where more than half the population is suffering catastrophic hunger.

Israel has threatened a major assault on Rafah to defeat thousands of Hamas fighters it says are holed up there. But the city is also a refuge for hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who have fled combat further north in the coastal enclave following Israel’s previous evacuation orders.

They have crammed into tented camps and makeshift shelters, suffering from shortages of food, water and medicine. Rafah’s main maternity hospital, where nearly half of Gaza’s births take place, has stopped admitting patients, the United Nations Population Fund told Reuters on Wednesday.

Hamas said its fighters were battling Israeli forces in the east and Islamic Jihad’s fighters attacked Israeli soldiers and military vehicles with heavy artillery near the airport. Israeli tank shells landed in the middle of Rafah wounding at least 25 people, medics said.

A senior U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Washington had carefully reviewed the delivery of weapons that might be used in Rafah and as a result paused a shipment consisting of 1,800 2,000-pound (907-kg) bombs and 1,700 500-pound bombs.

This would be the first such delay since the Biden administration, offered its “ironclad” support to Israel after Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack. Washington is Israel’s closest ally and main weapons supplier.

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said the decision was taken in the context of Israel’s plan to invade Rafah, which Washington opposes without civilian safeguards