According to rescuers in Gaza, six people were killed and several more wounded in pre-dawn Israeli air strikes in the north and centre of the Palestinian territory on Sunday.

Civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal said five people were killed in a strike on a home in Jabalia, in the north.

Another person was killed in a drone strike on tents sheltering displaced people west of Nuseirat in central Gaza, he added.

The Israeli military has stepped up its Gaza operations in recent days in what it has described as a renewed push to destroy Hamas.

On Saturday afternoon, the military said it had carried out strikes on more than 100 targets throughout Gaza over the past day.

Gaza’s health ministry said Saturday that at least 3,747 people had been killed in the territory since a ceasefire collapsed on March 18, taking the war’s overall toll to 53,901, mostly civilians.

Hamas’s October 2023 attack on Israel that triggered the war resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.

Sources also confirm that militants took 251 hostages, 57 of whom remain in Gaza including 34 the Israeli military says are dead.