Two Israeli air strikes targeting aid supplies killed at least 11 Palestinians in Gaza, medics said, as Israeli tanks pushed deeper into Rafah in the south and fought their way back into areas in the north they had already subdued months ago.
One strike at a food distribution centre in Gaza city, near the Shati refugee camp, killed three people.
Another strike, near Bani Suhaila town in southern Gaza, killed at least eight, including guards who accompany aid trucks, the medics said.
There was no immediate comment from Israel, which denies attacking aid efforts and accuses militants of causing harm to civilians.
Overnight, an Israeli air strike at a medical clinic in Gaza city killed the director of Gaza's Ambulance and Emergency Department, the enclave's health ministry said.
Israel's military claimed the strike had killed a senior Hamas armed commander.
The health ministry said the killing of Hani al-Jaafarawi brought the number of medical staff killed by Israeli fire since 7 October to 500. At least 300 others have so far been detained.
In a statement, the Israeli military said the strike targeted Mohammad Salah, who it claimed was responsible for developing Hamas weaponry.
No ceasefire accord
More than eight months into the fighting, international mediation backed by the United States has so far failed to bring a ceasefire agreement.
Hamas said any agreement must bring an end to the war, while Israel claims it will agree only temporary pauses in fighting until it destroys Hamas.
In Rafah, near the border with Egypt, Israeli forces which took control of the eastern, southern, and central parts of the city pursued their raid into the western and northern areas, said residents, describing heavy fighting.
Residents had said yesterday that Israeli tanks had advanced to the edge of the Mawasi displaced persons' camp in the northwest of Rafah, forcing many families to leave northward to Khan Younis and to Deir Al-Balah in central Gaza, the only city in the enclave where tanks have not yet invaded.
"The situation in Tel Al-Sultan, in western Rafah, remains very dangerous. Drones and Israeli snipers are hunting people who try to check on their houses, and tanks continue to take over areas overseeing Al-Mawasi further west," Bassam, a resident of Rafah, told Reuters via a messaging app.
The Israeli military claimed its forces continued "intelligence-based targeted operations" in Rafah, locating weapons and rocket launchers and killing militants "who posed threats to them."
In the north of the enclave, where Israel had said its forces completed operations months ago, residents said tanks had pushed back into Gaza city's Zeitoun suburb and were attacking several areas there.
In Deir al-Balah, now the last refuge for many thousands of Gazans following the invasion of Rafah, medics at a clinic were trying to treat malnutrition in children and measure the extent of famine in Gaza.
"With the displacement, communities are settling in new locations that do not have access to clean water, or there is not adequate access to food," said Muaamar Said, a doctor with aid group International Medical Corps.
"We fear there are more cases being missed."
Netanyahu claims intense fighting could end soon
Israel's war on Gaza was triggered when Hamas-led militants attacked southern Israel on 7 October, killing around 1,200 people and seizing more than 250 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.
The Israeli war has killed almost 37,600 people, according to Palestinian health authorities, and has left Gaza in ruins.
Since early May, fighting has focused on Rafah, on Gaza's southern edge where around half of the enclave's 2.3 million people had been sheltering after fleeing other areas.
Mr Netanyahu said the phase of intense fighting against Hamas would end "very soon".
In an interview with Israel's channel 14, he said forces based in Gaza would be freed to move to the north, where Israel has warned of a potential full-blown war against Lebanon's Hezbollah movement, which has struck the border region in solidarity with the Palestinians.
"After the intense phase is finished, we will have the possibility to move part of the forces north. And we will do this," Mr Netanyahu said.
The interview was Mr Netanyahu's first since the start of the war in a television format he has favoured in election campaigns.
He said he would support only a temporary ceasefire, before troops would return to fighting.
Hamas said this was evidence that he was reneging on a truce offer touted by the White House and backed by the United Nations.
The remarks showed that Mr Netanyahu was using ceasefire negotiations only as a stalling tactic while combat continues, Ezzat El-Reshiq, a senior Hamas political official who lives in exile, said in a statement.
Palestinian factions trade blame as unity talks postponed
Reconciliation talks between Hamas and Fatah due to be held in China this month have been delayed and no new date has been set, Palestinian officials have said, underlining dim chances of Palestinian unity even as Israel presses its Gaza offensive.
After hosting a meeting of Palestinian factions in April, China said Fatah - which is led by President Mahmoud Abbas - and Hamas had expressed the will to seek reconciliation through unity talks in Beijing.
Officials from Fatah and Hamas had previously said the follow-up meeting would be in mid-June.
But with the factions deeply split, analysts had held out little hope of the talks achieving a breakthrough towards a deal that could create a unified Palestinian administration for the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza, controlled by the militant Islamist movement Hamas since 2007.
Fatah and Hamas traded blame over the delay.
Senior Hamas official Basem Naim, who attended the previous meeting, told Reuters Fatah had requested an indefinite delay.
Fatah spokesperson Abdel Fattah Dawla said his movement had not rejected the invitation to meet but had held discussions with the Chinese ambassador about the proposed date in light of he what he described as escalating Israeli aggression and "the complexities of events".
An alternative date had been proposed, but Hamas had responded by refusing to take part, Mr Dawla said.
A Hamas official denied this account, saying the movement had not rejected another meeting.
The Chinese foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a request seeking comment.
Middle East conflict on brink of expanding - Borrell
Earlier, European foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said the Middle East was close to seeing the conflict expanding into Lebanon, just days after Lebanon's Iran-backed Hezbollah threatened EU member Cyprus.
"The risk of this war affecting the south of Lebanon and spilling over is every day bigger," Mr Borrell told reporters ahead of a foreign ministers meeting in Luxembourg. "We are on the eve of the war expanding."
Hezbollah began attacking Israel shortly after Hamas' 7 October assault sparked the war in Gaza, and the sides have been trading blows in the months since then. Hezbollah has said it would not stop until there is a ceasefire in Gaza.
In a televised address last Wednesday, Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah warned that "no place" in Israel would "be spared our rockets" if a wider war began.
He also threatened nearby Cyprus if it opened its airports or bases to Israel "to target Lebanon".
Earlier in June, Hezbollah targeted Israeli towns and military sites with the largest volleys of rockets and drones in the hostilities so far, after an Israeli strike killed the most senior Hezbollah commander yet.
