CAIRO: Israeli forces pressed deeper into areas of the central and southern Gaza Strip as they battled Hamas fighters, while Palestinian health officials said on Thursday that Israeli strikes had killed at least 27 people across the enclave.
The new escalation comes hours after US President Joe Biden pressed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the urgency of sealing a deal for a truce in Gaza and the release of hostages, the White House said.
Months of on-off talks on a ceasefire have circled the same issues, but Israel and Hamas have stuck firmly to their demands.
In the northern Gaza town of Beit Lahiya, a strike on a house killed 11 people, including children and women, the bodies of some of whom had been burnt, according to the Hamas-run territory's Civil Emergency Service.
Medics said another strike killed six people, including a local journalist, in a house in Al Maghazi camp in the central Gaza Strip, medics said while five others were killed in separate strikes in the south.
Later on Thursday, five Palestinians were killed and several wounded in an Israeli airstrike that hit people near a square in Khan Yunis, health officials said.
The Israeli military said its forces had intensified their operations in Deir Al Balah, in central Gaza, and Khan Yunis, in the south, dismantling dozens of military structures, locating rockets, and killing militants, over the past 24 hours.
It said forces killed 50 militants in the area of Rafah, in the far south of the enclave, over the past day.
The armed wing of Hamas said fighters ambushed an Israeli force in Rafah, killing and wounding several of them.
A phone call between Biden and Netanyahu late on Wednesday followed a whirlwind trip to the region by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken that ended on Tuesday without producing a breakthrough in the 10-month-old war.
Hamas wants a deal that ends the war in Gaza and releases Israeli and foreign hostages in Gaza in return for the freedom of many Palestinians jailed by Israel. It blames Israel and the United States for the failure to conclude a deal.
Netanyahu says the war will only end once Hamas is defeated, and that a ceasefire to allow the exchange of hostages and prisoners would be only a temporary pause while the militant group remains a threat. He denies obstructing a deal.
TANKS AND DRONES
In the central Gaza town of Deir Al Balah, which houses around 1 million residents and displaced Palestinians, according to the municipal council, residents said tanks advanced further from the east and blocked some roads connecting the city with the nearby Khan Yunis in the south.
Israeli tanks have also advanced to the west, in Al Karara and Hamad areas of Khan Yunis, pushing more families out of their shelters and tents, sometimes under heavy fire from tanks and drones, residents said.
Some families slept on the roads, others on the beach after they failed to find space or shelter.
"Last night drones began firing towards the tents, we ducked down, for maybe hours, then the noise of tanks got louder as they advanced closer, so we decided to run," Imad Al Ghalayeeni, 48, said by phone from Khan Yunis.
"We are five families, 48 persons, we ran to the beach, some slept on the road, others slept onshore, just on the sand with no tents, no blankets or mattresses and you can imagine how terrified were the children and women," he added.
Al Ghalayeeni said there was growing disillusionment among Palestinians in Gaza about the ceasefire talks.
"These talks are time-wasting, and they aim to give Netanyahu the time he needs to continue what he is doing. There is no place the tanks didn't enter, or bomb, and there is nowhere safe anymore," he said.
Most of Gaza's 2.3 million population has been displaced multiple times since the start of the war. Even in areas designated safe zones, there have been regular reports of casualties from Israeli strikes.
In a hospital in the northern Gaza camp of Jabalia, health officials said they were forced to suspend several services in the facility, except for lifesaving treatment, after they ran out of fuel.
Israel's military campaign has killed more than 40,000 people in Gaza since October, according to Palestinian health authorities. — Reuters
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