Gaza Toll Hits 342 as Israel Announces 2 Soldiers Killed in Militant Infiltration

The Gaza death toll hit 342 on Saturday as Israeli warplanes intensified their bombardment and troops pressed a ground assault on the 12th day of a major confrontation with Hamas.

The latest incident in Gaza saw one man killed in an air strike on the northern town of Jabaliya shortly after two were killed in a strike near Deir al-Balah in central Gaza, emergency services spokesman Ashraf al-Qudra said.

And another two people were killed in Zeitun, east of Gaza city, raising the number of Palestinians killed on Saturday to 46.

The latest deaths also included a 20-year-old man in southern Gaza's Khan Yunis, and a 16-year-old killed in Rafah, also in southern Gaza, emergency services spokesman Ashraf al-Qudra said.

Another two men were killed east of Deir al-Balah, he added.

Their deaths followed those of five members of the Zuweidi family, including two girls aged two and six years old, in Gaza's northern Beit Hanun.

Four men were also killed in two separate air strikes in northern Gaza's Beit Lahiya, Qudra added, along with one person killed in the Qarara district of southern Khan Yunis.

Another three men were killed in an air strike in central Gaza, he added.

Earlier, Qudra also reported five bodies had been pulled from a home hit by an Israeli air strike in Khan Yunis.

Some 2,385 Palestinians have been wounded, Qudra said.

Meanwhile, Israel's army announced the deaths of two of its soldiers on Saturday in a clash with Gaza militants who had breached the Jewish state's border, hours after they had been reported wounded.

An army statement said the two, Sergeant Adar Bersano, 20, from Neharyia, and Major Amotz Greenberg, 45, from Hod Hasharon, were killed fighting a group of militants who infiltrated Israel through a tunnel from the center of the Gaza Strip.

The army had earlier said two soldiers were wounded in a clash with the militants, who had been "aiming to carry out a lethal attack in one of the nearby communities".

The militants had fired machineguns and an anti-tank missile at the soldiers, who returned fire, "killing a terrorist and forcing the rest back into Gaza".

Hamas's military wing, the Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades, said 12 of their men stayed "behind enemy lines" for six hours before engaging in "direct confrontation with the enemy to avenge the blood of our martyrs, particularly the children."

The militants claimed they "killed six soldiers on patrol and wounded several others," but the Israeli army said there were only two deaths.

Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades said its fighters clashed with "Israeli special forces" in a house east of Khan Yunis, in southern Gaza, wounding some of them.

The army denied any soldiers were wounded in this incident.

The deaths raise to three the number of soldiers killed since Israel on July 8 launched a military operation to halt rocket fire by Gaza militants.

In the same period two Israeli citizens have been killed by Gaza rockets, the most recent a Bedouin man near Israel's nuclear reactor in the southern town of Dimona.

Another civilian died Tuesday when a mortar round exploded in Israel and a soldier was killed by friendly fire inside Gaza on Friday.

Also on Saturday, U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon headed to the region to join truce efforts.

His peace push came as Israel was poised to intensify a ground operation inside the besieged Palestinian territory it says is necessary to stop militants tunneling into the Jewish state.

Despite the pounding, Palestinian commandos succeeded in infiltrating Israel, sparking a deadly skirmish with an army patrol, as Gaza's bloodiest conflict since 2009 showed no signs of letting up.

The United States urged its Israeli ally to do more to limit the high civilian death toll from the operation, while supporting the Jewish state's right to defend itself.

President Barack Obama said Washington was "deeply concerned about the risks of further escalation and the loss of more innocent life".

He added that Washington was "hopeful" that Israel would operate "in a way that minimizes civilian casualties".

But Israeli army chief Lieutenant General Benny Gantz, said the army was "expanding the ground phase of the operation".

"There will be moments of hardship," he warned in a briefing to the military, anticipating further Israeli casualties.

Troops killed a Palestinian militant who tunneled into southern Israel but others managed to withdraw back into Gaza, an army statement said.

"Several terrorists infiltrated Israel through a tunnel from the central Gaza Strip," it said, adding that they fired a machine gun and anti-tank missile at an army patrol.

Troops "returned fire, killing a terrorist and forcing the rest back into Gaza."

Hamas's military wing, the Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades, said its fighters had carried out the raid.

"The Qassam Brigades carried out an operation behind enemy lines," it said in a statement. "Heavy fighting is ongoing with the forces of the occupation."

In a separate incident, the army said, militants had strapped explosives on to a donkey in an attempt to attack troops.

"Yesterday (Friday) evening, there was at least one such attempt, in which a donkey suspiciously began to approach forces," it said.

"The forces engaged the donkey and it exploded at a safe distance."

In the northern Israel Arab town of Kafr Kana about 1,500 people demonstrated against the Gaza military action in a protest called by the Israeli Islamic movement, public radio said.

Israel has said the aim of the ground operation launched on Thursday night is to destroy Hamas's network of tunnels which are used for cross-border attacks on southern Israel.

Military spokesman Lieutenant General Peter Lerner told journalists Saturday that during the past 24 hours the military had seized 13 tunnels into Israel.

Meanwhile, the U.N. said Ban would leave for the region Saturday to help Israelis and Palestinians "end the violence and find a way forward," under-secretary-general for political affairs Jeffrey Feltman told the Security Council.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he had ordered the military to be ready for "a significant broadening of the ground activity".

He said the ground operation was necessary to deal with the tunnels, but admitted there was "no guarantee of 100 percent success".

In Gaza, after a relative lull Friday, violence picked up again in the evening, with intensifying tank shelling and air strikes killing more than a dozen people.

The U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees UNRWA has opened 44 of its schools to shelter those fleeing homes in the most heavily bombarded areas.

It said on Saturday there were more 50,000 Gazans seeking sanctuary so far.

The World Food Program said it had already distributed emergency food rations and food vouchers to more than 20,000 displaced people.

It said it was gearing up for a huge increase in the coming days and hoping to reach 85,000 people with food distributions.

Gaza was also struggling with a 70 percent power outage after electricity lines from Israel were damaged, officials said.

French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius, who was also in Cairo to join peace efforts, called for an urgent truce.

"The absolute priority is a ceasefire, but it must guarantee a lasting truce," he said, adding that it should take into account "Israel's security" and Palestinian demands.

Hamas has rejected Egyptian proposals for a truce, demanding an easing of a harsh Gaza blockade imposed by Israel in 2006 and the release of Palestinian prisoners.

Israel pulled out of Gaza in 2005. Hamas drove out loyalists of Abbas two years later but, to the dismay of Israel, reconciled with the Palestinian president after U.S.-brokered Middle East peace talks collapsed earlier this year.