Air strikes and shelling hit Gaza on Monday, witnesses said, as battles raged in the besieged territory's north and the far-southern city of Rafah where Israel's defence minister vowed to expand ground operations.

Witnesses told AFP that Israeli naval forces struck Rafah, and medics reported an air strike that hit a residential building in the city's western parts.    
The army said Israeli troops were "conducting targeted raids on terrorist infrastructure" in eastern Rafah where they had found "dozens of tunnel shafts".
Since the start of the long-threatened Rafah incursion in early May, Israeli forces have also been engaged in intense fighting in northern and central Gaza where the army says Hamas has regrouped after previously announcing these areas cleared of militants.

An AFP correspondent and Palestinian medics said Israeli warplanes carried out overnight strikes on Gaza City's centre and the southern neighbourhoods of Zeitun and Sabra.
Witnesses also reported helicopters hovering over northern Gaza's Jabalia refugee camp, one of the areas that has seen a resurgence of fighting in recent weeks, and air strikes on Al-Bureij camp and Deir al-Balah in central Gaza.
The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said Monday that at least 35,562 people have been killed in the territory during more than seven months of war between Israel and Palestinian militants.      

The toll includes 106 deaths in 24 hours, a ministry statement said, adding that 79,652 people have been wounded in the Gaza Strip since the war began when Hamas militants attacked Israel on October 7.