Residents of Rafah reported intense artillery shelling and gunfire in the southernmost Gaza town after Israel said it had seized a strategic corridor on the Palestinian territory’s border with Egypt.
The Israeli military launched its incursion into Rafah in early May, despite international objections over the fate of Palestinian civilians sheltering there.
A weekend strike that started a fire and killed dozens of people in a displacement camp sparked a wave of new condemnations, including a social media campaign with the slogan “All eyes on Rafah” that was shared by tens of millions of users.
Israel said on Wednesday that its forces had taken control of the 14-kilometer (8.5-mile) Philadelphia corridor on the Gaza-Egypt border that it suspects has been used for arms smuggling.
Military spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari announced that Israel had taken “operational control” of the narrow border area, where he said troops “discovered around 20 tunnels.”
Egypt, a longtime mediator in the conflict that has become increasingly vocal in its criticism of the Israeli operation, has rejected allegations of smuggling tunnels running beneath the buffer zone.
“Israel is using these allegations to justify continuing the operation in the Palestinian city of Rafah and prolonging the war for political purposes,” said a high-level Egyptian source, cited by state-linked Al-Qahera News.
Egyptian officials have said a potential Israeli takeover of Philadelphia could violate the two countries’ historic 1979 peace agreement, although there has been no official comment from Cairo since the military’s announcement.
An AFP correspondent reported artillery and gunfire in the Zeitoun neighborhood of Gaza City, in the north of the territory, where witnesses saw thick clouds of smoke rising over the Jabalia refugee camp and Beit Lahiya.
A steady stream of civilians fled Rafah, carrying their belongings on their shoulders, in cars or in donkey carts.
Before the Rafah offensive began, the United Nations said about 1.4 million people were sheltering there. Since then, a million people have fled the area, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, said.
The Israeli military said on Thursday that its forces had attacked more than 50 targets in Gaza the previous day.
Troops found weapons, explosives and tunnel shafts in Rafah, and fought fighters in Jabalia, it said in a statement.
The Israeli strike over the weekend and the ensuing fire, which devastated the camp for displaced Palestinians in Rafah, killed 45 people, according to Gaza officials, and sparked two days of discussions at the UN Security Council.
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