Israeli fighter jets continued to pummel the Gaza Strip in the early hours of Wednesday, flattening residential buildings and killing at least four Palestinians, including a journalist.
The latest raids came as Palestinian groups launched more rockets towards cities in southern Israel. There were no immediate reports of injuries.Earlier, Israeli forces shot dead four other Palestinians and wounded scores more during protests and a historic general strike in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem.
The strike was called in support of Palestinians under Israeli bombardment in Gaza.
At least 225 Palestinians, including 65 children, 30 women, have been killed in Gaza since the latest violence flared on May 10. About 1,500 Palestinians have been wounded.
Twelve people in Israel have died, including two children, while at least 300 Israelis have been wounded.
Despite the escalating violence – now in its tenth day – diplomatic efforts for a ceasefire between Israel and Gaza’s Hamas rulers have failed to make much headway.
The United States continued to block the UN Security Council from issuing a joint statement urging an end to the hostilities, telling diplomats that a public statement would not help calm the tensions.
France, however, said it was working with Israel’s neighbours, Egypt and Jordan, on a new ceasefire resolution.
China said it was “supportive” of the French proposal.
A UN Security Council meeting broke up without issuing a statement, but France then said it had proposed a resolution calling for a cease-fire, in coordination with Israel’s neighbors Egypt and Jordan.
Zhang Jun, Beijing’s ambassador to the UN, told reporters his team had heard the French cease-fire proposal and China was “supportive.”
Sporadic bombardment of Gaza city continued after midnight, with residents kept awake as Israeli jets flew low overhead, an AFP correspondent in the besieged coastal strip said.
Randa Abu Sultan, 45, said her family no longer knew what sleep was.
“We’re all terrified by the sound of explosions, missiles and fighter jets,” said the mother of seven.
“We all sit together in a single room. My four-year-old son tells me he’s scared that if he falls asleep he’ll wake up to find us dead.”
Earlier in the evening, an AFP photographer saw streaks of light in the sky as Israel’s air defense system intercepted rockets launched from Gaza.
Israeli forces and protesters meanwhile clashed at multiple flashpoints across the occupied West Bank and in east Jerusalem, hospitalising scores, as Palestinians rallied in solidarity with their besieged Gazan counterparts.
Dozens were treated for wounds caused by live bullets, medics said.
Israeli air strikes have killed 217 Palestinians, including 63 children, and wounded more than 1,400 people in just over a week in the Hamas-run enclave, according to Gaza’s health ministry.
The death toll on the Israeli side has risen to 12 after rockets Hamas fired at the southern Eshkol region killed two Thai nationals working in a factory, police said.
Hamas has launched nearly 3,700 rockets at Israel since May 10, often forcing people living by Gaza into bomb shelters around the clock.
Israel’s near-relentless bombing campaign in response has sent fireballs, debris and black smoke into the sky, leaving two million Palestinians in Gaza desperate for reprieve.
The humanitarian crisis has deepened in the impoverished strip, with the UN saying 72,000 Palestinians have been displaced.
But a convoy of international aid trucks that started rolling into Gaza through a border crossing from Israel, Kerem Shalom, was halted when Israel quickly shuttered it again, citing a mortar attack on the area.
Tuesday’s UN Security Council session, the fourth since the conflict escalated, was called after the United States, a key Israel ally, had once again blocked adoption of a joint statement calling for a halt to the violence the previous day.
“We do not judge that a public pronouncement right now will help de-escalate,” US envoy Linda Thomas-Greenfield said during Tuesday’s closed-door meeting, according to a diplomat.
France and Egypt have been pushing for a cease-fire deal, and EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell on Tuesday backed the manifold calls for one.
He also urged Israel’s military to act in a “proportionate” manner.
Israel says fighter jets have hit Hamas’s underground tunnels, which it has previously acknowledged run in part through civilian areas.
