West Bank Palestinians clash

Palestinian protesters and police in the Israeli-occupied West Bank have clashed as activists demanded the resignation of the territory's leader Mahmud Abbas.

Palestinian forces in Ramallah fired tear gas at demonstrators who had gathered, calling for Abbas to step down, apparently over his conciliatory tone since war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza began earlier this month.

The clashes came after the health ministry in Gaza, ruled by Hamas militants at war with Israel, said at least 200 people were killed in an Israeli strike on a hospital where displaced people had sheltered in the coastal enclave.

Israel has denied hitting the hospital saying that rockets fired by the Islamic Jihad militants struck the hospital.

From Jordan, Abbas announced "public mourning for three days and flags flown at half-mast for the martyrs of the Baptist hospital massacre and all our people's martyrs," the official Palestinian news agency Wafa said.

Hussein al-Sheikh, a senior Palestinian official, said Abbas was returning immediately "to the homeland" from Jordan where he, together with Egypt President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi was supposed to meet with United States President Joe Biden

Abbas "calls for an emergency meeting of the leadership tonight," Sheikh wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

The Palestinian Authority, led by Abbas, is based in Ramallah and is split from the militant group Hamas.