Want immediate Gaza de-escalation: Joe Biden to Benjamin Netanyahu

Israel says it has no 'timeframe' for ending hostilities; death toll tops 219

President Joe Biden told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday to wind down fighting with Hamas in the Gaza Strip that’s killed scores of civilians, a White House spokeswoman said.

“The president conveyed to the prime minister that he expected a significant de-escalation today on the path to a cease-fire,” White House spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters aboard Air Force One.

It was Biden’s fourth call with Netanyahu since hostilities broke out between Israel and Hamas last week. The president has come under pressure from Democratic congressional allies to push Israel toward a cease-fire in the conflict. Israel said on Wednesday it was not setting a timeframe for an end to hostilities with Gaza as its military pounded the Palestinian enclave with air strikes and Hamas militants unleashed new cross-border rocket attacks.

In a sign of diplomatic movement, however, an Egyptian security source said the two sides had agreed to a ceasefire in principle after help from mediators, but details were being negotiated in secret amid public denials of a deal to prevent it from collapsing. Palestinian medical officials said 219 people had now been killed in 10 days of aerial bombardments which have destroyed roads, buildings and other infrastructure, and worsened the already dire humanitarian situation in Gaza.

Israeli authorities put the death toll at 12 in Israel, where repeated rocket attacks have caused panic and sent people rushing into shelters. Regional and US-led diplomatic efforts to secure a ceasefire have intensified but so far failed.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made no mention of any halt to the fighting in public remarks at a briefing to foreign ambassadors to Israel, saying his country was engaged in "forceful deterrence" to prevent future conflict with Hamas. In remarks reported by Israeli media from a closed question-and-answer session, he was quoted as saying: "We're not standing with a stopwatch. We want to achieve the goals of the operation. Previous operations lasted a long time so it is not possible to set a timeframe."

France seeks UN Security Council resolution

China's UN ambassador says France is seeking a UN Security Council resolution calling for a cease-fire between Israel and Palestinian militants who control Gaza.

Zhang Jun, the current council president, confirmed that France's UN Ambassador Nicolas De Riviere informed the council during the third round of closed consultations Tuesday on the conflict that a resolution was being prepared.

The US has blocked the UN's most powerful body, which is charged with maintaining international peace, from issuing a statement calling for a halt to the violence, insisting that it would not help diplomatic efforts to end the conflict.