Gaza death toll rises as Israeli strikes continue

A drone attack by Israel targeting a residential apartment killed at least three people and injured several in besieged Gaza, local media reported.

The bombing targeted an apartment in Khan Yunis early on Thursday, which also left several others injured, some of them severely, the Palestinian news agency WAFA reported.

The targeted flat was destroyed and the surrounding properties suffered significant damage, said the report.

UN chief Antonio Guterres demanded an immediate end to the "unacceptable" civilian loss of life, urging all parties to exercise maximum restraint.

Also on Thursday, the Israeli military carried out strikes against the Islamic Jihad armed group killing a senior commander, Ali Ghali, when his apartment was hit.

According to Palestinian media reports, the strikes targeted the last floor of a building in southern Gaza, killing at least two people, including the commander.

Officials in the crowded coastal territory said 28 people had been killed since the fighting erupted on Tuesday.

Those killed by Israeli strikes include Islamic Jihad fighters as well as civilians.

Israel braced for more rocket fire amid reports of faltering Egyptian attempts to broker a ceasefire.

It has been the worst bout of fighting between Israel and Palestinian fighters in besieged Gaza in months, and among the dead were also women and children.

The conflagration comes at a time of soaring tensions and spiking violence over the past year in the occupied West Bank.

Mediation failed as fighting continues

Following intense fighting on Wednesday, when rockets rained down on southern and central Israel and airstrikes pounded besieged Gaza, a state-run Egyptian TV station announced that Egypt, a frequent mediator between the sides, had brokered a ceasefire.

But with the violence continuing into the early hours of Thursday, it appeared neither side was backing down.

The Israeli military says that in its strikes it has zeroed in on fighters with what it says are precision strikes, but children, among them a 4-year-old, were also killed.

Military spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari told Israeli Army Radio Thursday that a quarter of the rockets launched during this round of fighting fell in Gaza, killing at least four, including a 10-year-old girl .

Israel says the airstrikes are a response to a barrage of rocket fire launched last week by the Islamic Jihad in response to the death of one of its members from a hunger strike while in Israeli custody.

Israel says it is trying to avoid conflict with Hamas and limit the fighting to Islamic Jihad.

Israel war crimes

Israel has come under international criticism for the high civilian toll on Tuesday, which included wives of two of the movement's commanders, some of their children and a dentist who lived in one of the targeted buildings along with his wife and son.

In past conflicts, rights groups have accused Israel of committing war crimes due to high civilian deaths.

Israel says it does its utmost to avoid civilian casualties and holds armed groups responsible because they operate in heavily populated residential areas.

West Bank deaths

The latest violence comes on the second anniversary of a devastating 11-day war fought between Gaza fighters and Israel.

Hamas spokesman Abdul Latif al Qanou said on Wednesday that "the strikes of the unified resistance are part of the process of responding to the massacre committed by (Israel)".

On Wednesday, Israeli troops raided the occupied West Bank town of Qabatiya, killing two people whom the army accused of firing at soldiers.

The Palestinian health ministry identified the two men as Ahmed Jamal Tawfiq Assaf, 19, and Rani Walid Ahmed Qatanat, 24.

Condemnation

Germany meanwhile "strongly" condemned the "indiscriminate" Palestinian rocket attacks on Israel, which it said must "stop immediately".

This week's Gaza violence is the worst since a three-day escalation in August killed 49 Palestinians, with no Israeli fatalities.

The latest violence brings to 132 the number of Palestinians killed in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict so far this year

Nineteen Israelis, one Ukrainian and one Italian have been killed over the same period, according to an AFP count based on official sources from the two sides.

These figures include combatants as well as civilians, and, on the Israeli side, three members of the country's Palestinian minority with Israeli citizenship.

Millions under occupation

Densely populated Gaza, which is home to 2.3 million Palestinians, has been under Israeli blockade from land, air and sea, since 2005.

Israel occupied the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and Gaza during the 1967 Arab-Israeli War. It annexed the entire East Jerusalem city in 1980.

Palestine calls East Jerusalem, along with Gaza, as part of the country with East Jerusalem as the capital, currently under Israeli occupation.

Under international law, the West Bank and East Jerusalem are "occupied territories" and all Jewish settlement-building activities on the land are illegal.

Palestinians accuse Israel of waging an aggressive campaign to "Judaise" the historic city by effacing its Palestinian Arab and Islamic identity and driving out its Palestinian inhabitants.

Almost 700,000 illegal Israeli settlers live in over 130 settlements dotting the occupied West Bank alongside nearly three million Palestinians living under Israeli military occupation.