US, Israel leaders to speak by phone following Gaza aid deaths

US President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are set to speak on Thursday in their first phone call since an Israeli strike on a humanitarian convoy killed seven aid workers in Gaza.

Biden has led a chorus of international anger over the attack on employees of US-based World Central Kitchen, who were distributing desperately needed food to a population on the verge of famine.

"I can confirm President Biden and Prime Minister Netanyahu will speak tomorrow," a US official told the media on Wednesday.

The call comes after Biden said he was "outraged and heartbroken" by the deadly strike, whose victims included a US-Canadian dual national, along with three Britons, a Pole, an Australian and a Palestinian.

Biden's sharpening rhetoric, and insistence that Israel do more to protect aid workers and civilians, has indicated growing frustrations with how ally Israel is conducting its war on Hamas.

Israel has taken responsibility for the strike on the aid workers, which it called a mistake, and Defence Minister Yoav Gallant instructed the armed forces to "maintain an open and transparent line of communication" with international organisations conducting relief work.

A view of a vehicle where employees from WCK were killed in an Israeli airstrike in Deir Al-Balah, Gaza. Reuters

But Biden has emphasised the attack — which hit WCK-branded vehicles after the organisation said it had coordinated movements with Israeli forces — was not a "stand-alone incident".

At least 196 aid workers have been killed in Gaza in the almost six-month-old war, nearly three times the toll inflicted by any other single conflict in a year, according to a UN coordinator.

US National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby told reporters the strike was "emblematic of a larger problem and evidence of why distribution of aid in Gaza has been so challenging".

But the White House said that Biden continued to support Israel's "right to defend itself" and there were no plans to curb arms deliveries to the key US ally.

Monday's deaths have thrown into question how to safely continue deliveries as the territory faces a deepening hunger crisis, with children reportedly dying of starvation.

WCK, which called the strike "targeted", suspended its operations in the region and sent ships laden with hundreds of tonnes of undelivered supplies back to their Mediterranean port.

Other groups have since curtailed or reassessed their operations, with the UN on Tuesday pausing nighttime movement for the "evaluation of the security issues".

"Humanitarian aid organizations are unable to carry out their work safely," said the International Committee of the Red Cross.

Agence France-Presse