Iran said it was obliged to defend itself, after Israeli retaliatory strikes hit military targets and killed two soldiers in the Islamic republic on Saturday.

The United States urged Iran on Saturday to stop attacking Israel to break the cycle of violence after Israel launched strikes against the Islamic republic in retaliation for a missile barrage.

Saudi Arabia condemned Israeli strikes on military targets in Iran on Saturday, warning against any further expansion of the conflict in the Middle East.

The Iranian army said two soldiers were killed in Israeli air strikes on military installations in the Islamic republic on Saturday, according to a statement carried by state television.

Israel attacked Iran with a series of pre-dawn airstrikes Saturday in what it said was a response to the barrage of ballistic missiles the Islamic Republic fired upon Israel earlier in the month.

The Israeli military said its aircraft targeted facilities that Iran used to make missiles fired at Israel as well as surface-to-air missile sites. There was no immediate indication that oil or missile sites were hit — strikes that would have marked a much more serious escalation — and Israel offered no immediate damage assessment.

Gaza's civil defense agency said Friday that 12 people were killed by Israeli drone strikes that hit a group of Palestinians waiting to receive aid in the territory's north.

"Civil defense teams retrieved 12 martyrs and several injured individuals after Israeli drone strikes targeted a group of citizens and a vehicle waiting for aid," agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal said, adding that the drones struck near the Shati refugee camp in western Gaza City. There was no immediate comment from the military.

The Israeli army said Friday that three of its soldiers were killed in combat in north Gaza.

An army statement said the soldiers "fell during combat in northern Gaza", bringing the total number of Israeli soldiers killed in the Gaza campaign to 361 since the start of ground operations in the territory last year.

Israel’s military confirmed Friday that its troops were operating around Kamal Adwan hospital in north Gaza. The hospital’s director had said the facility was facing a catastrophic situation with bombardment, Israeli troops preventing the entry of crucial aid and patients dying for lack of medical supplies.

In a social media video posted late Thursday, the hospital’s director, Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya, said the hospital had been directly shelled by a tank, a claim the Israeli military did not immediately respond to.

Turkish air strikes on northern Iraq targeting a group affiliated with Turkey's outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) killed five people on Friday, local sources said.

"A series of Turkish air strikes targeted the Sinjar Resistance Units," a security official told AFP, reporting a total of five people killed, as the PKK claimed an attack on Wednesday at state-run Turkish Aerospace Industries (TAI) near Ankara, which Turkey said killed five people.

The Israeli military conducted operations overnight into Friday in Khan Younis, killing 38 people and injuring more than a dozen others, health officials said.

Palestinians who were killed or injured were taken to the European and Nasser Hospitals. Records from the European hospital obtained by the AP showed at least 15 members from al-Farra family were killed, including 13 children.