Israel battled Hamas terrorists in the Gaza Strip's biggest cities on Thursday and said it had attacked dozens of targets, leaving 350 Palestinians dead and the rest struggling to survive in rapidly shrinking areas of refuge.
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Gazans crammed into Rafah on the southern border with Egypt, heeding Israeli leaflets and messages saying that they would be safe in the city after successive warnings to head south.
Israel said terrorists had fired at least one rocket from Rafah and 12 from the desolate area of Al Mawasi on Gaza's southern Mediterranean coast where it has also advised displaced people to gather, leaving the status of the areas unclear.
Video: Dozens surrender in Gaza / Social media
In southern Gaza's largest city, Khan Younis, Israel said its forces killed a number of terrorists, including two terrorists who emerged firing from a tunnel. Residents reported several Israeli air strikes and non-stop tank fire in the city's east.
In Washington, a senior State Department official said US Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke with Israel's strategic affairs minister on Thursday, and told him Israel needs to do more to protect civilians in its offensive in southern Gaza.
Israeli troops reached the heart of Khan Younis on Wednesday in a new phase of the war, now entering its third month. Health officials said three people were killed there on Thursday.
Israel says it must wipe out Hamas and is doing everything possible to get civilians out of harm's way.
Israel said it had raided a Hamas compound in Jabalia, killing several terrorists and found tunnels, a training area and weapons. Israeli television showed scores of men, stripped to their underwear, sitting on a road. Maariv newspaper said they were Hamas fighters captured in Gaza City.
The armed wing of Hamas said fighters had destroyed or damaged 79 army vehicles in Gaza City in the past three days but did not produce evidence.
The surprise Hamas incursion on Oct 7. killed 1,200 people, with 240 people taken hostage, according to Israel's tally.
The Israeli military says 88 soldiers have been killed in ground incursions into Gaza that began on Oct. 20.
The UN has been unable to distribute aid in any part of Gaza except for the area around Rafah for the past four days, it said in its daily humanitarian report on Thursday.
A senior Hamas official told Reuters mediators were still exploring opportunities for a truce and reiterated its demand that Israel cease its attacks.
A guided-missile attack from Lebanon killed a 60-year-old farmer in northern Israel on Thursday, Israel's public broadcaster Kan said, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned that Beirut would be turned "into Gaza" if Hezbollah, a Hamas ally, started an all-out war.
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