Israel pressed on with its offensive in and around Gaza's main cities on Friday, with another 40 dying in its strikes near Gaza City, and "dozens" more in Jabalia and Khan Yunis in the south of the besieged Palestinian territory.

Backed by air power, tanks and armored bulldozers, Israeli troops are fighting in Khan Yunis, the biggest city in southern Gaza, as well as in Gaza City and Jabalia district in the north. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said troops had closed in on the Khan Yunis home of Hamas's Gaza chief Yahya Sinwar, 61, vowing "it is only a matter of time until we find him."

Israeli forces have encircled major urban centers as they seek to destroy Hamas over its unprecedented attack on 7 October, when militants broke through Gaza's militarized border to kill around 1,200 people and seize hostages, 138 of whom remain captive, according to Israeli figures.

The fighting in Gaza has killed 89 Israeli soldiers so far, including Gal — the son of war cabinet minister Gadi Eisenkot — on Thursday.

It also pushed Gazans south, turning Rafah near the Egyptian border into a vast camp for many of the 1.9 million displaced by the conflict — 80 percent of Gaza's population.

"Two months on the road, moving from one place to another. These are the hardest two months we have experienced in our lives," Abdallah Abu Daqqa, displaced from Khan Yunis to Rafah, said.

Air strikes have followed them.

Eight more hit Rafah overnight. Agence France-Presse journalists saw around 20 corpses in white body bags, including a child, at its Nasser hospital, while men gathered nearby to pray.

The mass civilian casualties in the conflict have sparked global concern, heightened by dire shortages caused by an Israeli siege that has seen only limited access for food, water, fuel and medicines.

Israel has approved a "minimal" increase in fuel supplies to prevent a "humanitarian collapse and the outbreak of epidemics" and called on the international community to "increase its capabilities" to distribute aid.

United Nations humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths said there were "promising signs" Israel may open the southern Kerem Shalom crossing to aid deliveries.

But Hamas has declared a "state of famine" in northern Gaza, saying no aid has arrived there since 1 December.

And Israeli rights group B'Tselem said the "minuscule amount of aid" allowed into the territory was "tantamount to deliberately starving the population."                                          

WITH AFP