The Israeli military said on Friday it had struck more than 450 targets in Gaza from land, sea and air over the past 24 hours - the most since a truce collapsed last week and about double the daily figures typically reported since then.
With the vast majority of Gazans now displaced and unable to access any aid, hospitals overrun and food running out, the main UN agency there said society was on the verge of a full-blown collapse.
Residents and the Israeli military both reported intensified fighting in both northern areas, where Israel had previously said its troops had largely completed their tasks last month, and in the south where they launched a new assault this week.
Gaza's health ministry reported 350 people killed on Thursday, bringing the death toll from Israel's two-month campaign in Gaza to more than 17,170, with thousands more missing and presumed buried under rubble. More strikes were reported on Friday morning in Khan Younis in the south, the Nusseirat camp in the centre and Gaza City in the north.
Israel launched its campaign to annihilate the Hamas that rules Gaza alleging Hamas killing 1,200 people and seizing more than 240 hostages.
Since then, the vast majority of Gaza's 2.3 million people have been driven from their homes, many forced to flee three or four times, with only the belongings they can carry.
With the fighting now extended across both halves of the Gaza Strip at the same time, residents say it has become almost impossible to find refuge.
Hamas reported the most intense clashes with Israeli forces were taking place in the north in Gaza City's Shejaia district, as well as in the south in Khan Younis, where Israelis reached the heart of the enclave's second-biggest city on Wednesday.
The Israeli military's Arabic-language spokesman posted to social media that troops were operating forcefully against Hamas and terrorist organizations in the Gaza Strip, especially in the Khan Younis area and the northern Strip.
Reuters journalists in the southern Gaza Strip have seen dead and wounded overrunning the main Nasser hospital in Khan Younis, where there was no room on the floor on Friday for arriving patients sprawled across bloodsmeared tiles.
Reuters was unable to enter other parts of the enclave but reached residents by telephone. With the fighting now in all directions, there was no place left to flee.
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