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GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip – Israeli troops, some smiling and dancing, began to withdraw from Gaza Sunday after their government and Hamas militants declared an end to a three-week war. But neither side achieved long-term goals, and the burden of consolidating the fragile calm fell to world leaders.

The truce brought relief to Gaza's citizens, who took stock of the devastation in relative safety for the first time since Israel launched the offensive on Dec. 27. And it brought more trauma, as rescue workers in surgical masks ventured into what were once no-go areas and pulled 100 bodies from buildings pulverized by bombs.

"We've pulled out my nephew, but I don't know how many are still under there," Zayed Hadar said as he sifted through the rubble of his flattened home in the northern town of Jebaliya.

Tension eased in southern Israel, the target of Palestinian rocket fire, even though Hamas launched nearly 20 rockets in a final salvo before announcing a cease-fire. Three Israelis were lightly wounded, while two Palestinians were killed in last-minute fighting, medics said.

Israel and Hamas do not recognize each other and ended up separately declaring cease-fires 12 hours apart after strenuous efforts by Egyptian mediators to get an agreement. Israel first announced a unilateral cease-fire that took effect early Sunday, with Hamas initially vowing to keep fighting until all troops left Gaza. Later Sunday, Hamas also said it would hold its fire to give Israeli forces time to pull out.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said his country had no desire to stay in Gaza, a Mediterranean strip of 1.4 million people that was vacated by Israel in 2005 even though Gaza's airspace, coastal waters and border crossings remained under Israeli control.

"We didn't set out to conquer Gaza. We didn't set out to control Gaza. We don't want to remain in Gaza, and we intend on leaving Gaza as fast as possible," Olmert said at a dinner in Jerusalem with the leaders of Britain, France, Germany and Spain.

A swift withdrawal would reduce the likelihood of clashes between militants and Israeli troops that could rupture the truce.

Despite losses suffered, Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh claimed "a heavenly victory" in remarks broadcast on Al-Jazeera Arabic news channel.

The world welcomed the apparent end to the latest round of fighting in the Middle East. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged a quick influx of humanitarian aid to the isolated enclave, and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice — in the final days of her tenure — said a cease-fire must be durable.

Iran, which has supplied rockets to Hamas, said a key to calm is the opening of border crossings that Israel and Egypt have kept virtually sealed since the militant group staged a violent takeover of Gaza in 2007 from forces of the rival Fatah faction, headed by Western-backed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

The comment by Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki was a reminder that the tiny coastal territory is just one piece of a larger conflict between Israel and regional enemies.

In Egypt, European and Arab leaders were seeking a long-term deal to solidify the truce. Delivering humanitarian aid to rebuild Gaza, opening its borders and choking off the flow of weapons into Gaza through tunnels under the 8-mile Gaza-Egypt border and at sea — perhaps with an international naval force — emerged as key goals from their summit at the Sinai desert resort of Sharm el-Sheik.

The gathering, however, failed to deliver specifics on international monitors to stop weapons from reaching Gaza's Hamas rulers. Israel wants monitors, but Egypt has refused to have them on its side of the border.

The Israeli military warned that the next few days were critical and that any Hamas attacks would be met with harsh retaliation.

"Right now the operation hasn't ended," Maj. Gen. Amir Eshel said. "It has just transitioned to a new phase, to hold fire. To give a chance to a cease-fire to take over and end this operation."

Israeli soldiers danced on top of a tank and gave "V" for victory signs as they pulled out of Gaza, but the war moved to a close on an ambiguous note.

Israel emerged as the winner on the battlefield. But its chief goals — a permanent end to rocket attacks on Israel and weapons smuggling into Gaza — will require hard diplomacy and sustained international cooperation to achieve.

Hamas, meanwhile, lost hundreds of fighters and failed to turn Gaza into a graveyard for masses of Israeli troops, as it had promised. It hopes that its survival will boost its standing among Arab supporters as a foe, as well as righteous victim, of the Jewish state.

While both sides put their best spin on the conflict's seeming conclusion, noncombatants were the biggest losers. More than half of the 1,259 slain Palestinians were civilians, according to medics, human rights groups and the U.N.

Aid groups sought to funnel more supplies to hospitals and food distribution sites from Egyptian and Israeli border crossings.

At least 13 Israelis, 10 of them soldiers, were killed, according to Israel. Hamas fired hundreds of rockets at southern Israel, intensifying the fear of hundreds of thousands of people who had lived under the threat for years.

"We did a good job. Now we're going home," an Israeli soldier told Israeli television. His name was not released in line with military restrictions on the release of information. Smiling infantry soldiers walked toward the border in the rain, and a rainbow emerged from the clouds behind them.

The war had overwhelming popular support in Israel, a democracy where, in contrast, opinion was sharply divided over the 2006 war against Hezbollah militants in Lebanon. Israel was condemned in street demonstrations around the world for the heavy toll on Palestinian civilians, and ties with the United Nations deteriorated after U.N. facilities were hit during Israeli attacks.

Hamas' deputy leader, Moussa Abu Marzouk, said on Syrian television that the cease-fire would give Israel time to withdraw and open crossings to allow aid into Gaza.

The truce took effect ahead of Tuesday's inauguration of Barack Obama as president. Obama has said Mideast peace will be a priority for his administration even as it grapples with a global economic crisis. Israel also holds elections next month.

Leaders of Germany, France, Spain, Britain, Italy, Turkey and the Czech Republic, which holds the rotating European Union presidency, attended the summit in Egypt.

Israel did not send a representative. Hamas, shunned internationally as a terrorist organization, was not invited. However, any arrangement to open Gaza's borders for trade would likely need Hamas acquiescence.

"We must put an end to the arms traffic," said French President Nicolas Sarkozy. "Several of our countries have proposed ... to make available to Israel and Egypt all the technical, diplomatic and military — notably naval — means to help stop weapons smuggling into Gaza."

Sarkozy, joined by other European leaders, later traveled to Jerusalem for a working dinner with Olmert.

In Gaza, bulldozers shoved aside rubble while men tugged at piles of masonry with their hands and plucked decomposing bodies from the debris. People recovered televisions and anything else of value from piles of debris, or loaded vans and donkey carts with belongings and ventured home.

In the southern town of Rafah, where Israel bombed dozens of smuggling tunnels, construction worker Abdel Ibn-Taha rejoiced over the truce. "We're tired," he said.

In the Israeli town of Sderot, battered by Palestinian rockets from Gaza, residents went back to their usual routines. One man sat on a sidewalk in the sunshine, eating a chicken sandwich.

JERUSALEM – The U.N. Security Council called for an "immediate" and "durable" cease-fire in Gaza in a resolution Thursday night even as fighting between Israel and Hamas raged — with early morning airstrikes killing seven Palestinians and pushing the death toll to about 760 in the near two-week conflict.

Palestinian demonstrators use sling-shots to hurl stones at Israeli soldiers

suspended food deliveries to Gaza and the Red Cross accused Israel of blocking medical assistance after forces fired on aid workers. It also followed concerns of a wider conflict which flared as militants in Lebanon fired rockets into northern Israel.

The vote was 14-0, with the United States abstaining. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said the U.S. "fully supports" the resolution but abstained "to see the outcomes of the Egyptian mediation" with Israel and Hamas, also aimed at achieving a cease-fire.

Israel and Hamas were not parties to the vote and it will now be up to them to stop the fighting. But the text of the resolution was hammered out by the United States, Israel's chief ally, and by Arab nations that have ties to Hamas and the Palestinians in the Israeli-occupied territories.

As the Security Council took action late Thursday in New York, it was early Friday in Gaza and violence continued unabated — an Israeli airstrike flattened a five-story building in northern Gaza, killing at least seven people, including an infant, Hamas security officials said. It was one of more than 30 targets struck before dawn by Israeli warplanes. It was not immediately clear whether the owner of the destroyed house was linked to Hamas.

Militants in Lebanon fired several Katyusha rockets into northern Israel early Thursday, including one that tore through the roof of a nursing home and injured two people. Israel responded swiftly with mortar fire, raising the possibility of a two-front conflict.

With Friday's toll, nearly 760 Palestinians and 13 Israelis have died in the 13 days of fighting in Gaza, an assault launched by Israel in an attempt to halt rocket fire from the territory, controlled by the militant Islamic Hamas. Hamas said it fired 25 rockets and 12 mortars at Israel on Thursday.

The conflict has left hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza increasingly desperate for food, water, fuel and medical assistance, and the situation was expected to worsen as humanitarian efforts fall victim to the fighting.

The Security Council resolution "stresses the urgency of and calls for an immediate, durable and fully respected cease-fire, leading to the full withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza." It expressed "grave concern" at the escalating violence and the deepening humanitarian crisis in Gaza and emphasized the need to open all border crossings and achieve a lasting solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict.

It also calls on U.N. member states "to intensify efforts to provide arrangements and guarantees in Gaza in order to sustain a durable cease-fire and calm, including to prevent illicit trafficking in arms and ammunition and to ensure the sustained re-opening" of border crossings.

In addition, the resolution "condemns all violence and hostilities directed against civilians," calls for "unimpeded" humanitarian access to Gaza, and welcomes the initiative to open "humanitarian corridors."

Simon Horner, of the European Commission aid department, said 60 percent of Gaza's 1.4 million people have no electricity, and fewer people every day have access to clean water. The sewage system is in danger of a failing, which could lead to an outbreak of disease, and medical services were under severe stress.

"The inability of the U.N. to provide assistance in this worsening humanitarian crisis is unacceptable," said Michele Montas, a U.N. spokeswoman.

She said according to reports, the attack on the U.N. truck, which killed two Palestinian workers, took place during a three-hour humanitarian lull announced by the Israel Defense Force. Four U.N. Relief and Works Agency local staff have been killed in the conflict.

In Geneva, the International Committee of the Red Cross said it would restrict aid operations to Gaza City for at least one day after one of its convoys came under Israeli fire at the Netzarim crossing during the three-hour lull in fighting Thursday. One driver was lightly injured.

The World Health Organization said 21 Palestinian medical workers have been killed and 30 more injured since Israel began its offensive.

The Israeli military said in a statement that it cooperates closely with foreign aid groups to help civilians, and said Hamas uses civilians as human shields.

The international Red Cross also accused Israel of hindering rescuers from reaching areas devastated in the battles. Ambulances could not get to the Zeitoun neighborhood for four days because the Israelis had blocked access with large earthen barriers, officials said.

When they were allowed in Wednesday, the rescuers "found four small children next to their dead mothers in one of the houses. They were too weak to stand up on their own. One man was also found alive, too weak to stand up," the ICRC said in a rare public statement. "In all, there were at least 12 corpses lying on mattresses" in one of the houses.

During the lull in fighting Thursday, Palestinian health officials dug out 35 bodies from several areas around Gaza that had been engulfed by battles or struck by Israeli air attacks since Israel launched its offensive against Hamas, said Moaiya Hassanain of the Palestinian Health Ministry.

At least 24 Palestinians were killed in Gaza on Thursday, including three elderly people fleeing their home, according to Hassanain. He estimated the death toll around 750, and U.N officials say about half were civilians.

Three Israeli soldiers were killed in combat Thursday, raising the number of soldiers killed in the conflict to 10, including one who died in a mortar strike before the ground invasion began. Three Israeli civilians have been killed by rockets.

Gaza militants unleashed 24 missiles at southern Israel on Thursday, wounding four people.

Egyptian-led diplomatic cease-fire efforts showed no immediate breakthroughs. Israeli representatives concluded talks in Cairo and returned home, one day after Hamas leaders reviewed the French-Egyptian plan that might offer a role in Gaza to the rival Palestinian Authority.

Israel's government said Wednesday it viewed the proposal positively, but only if it guaranteed a halt to rocket fire on Israeli territory from Gaza and ensured Hamas cannot rearm. A Hamas official said the Islamic militant group was not ready to either accept or reject the plan.

But Mohammed Nazzal, a member of Hamas' Damascus-based political leadership, said, "We will never raise the white flag. I believe there are going to be fierce battles and the resistance factions will fight house to house, street to street and neighborhood to neighborhood."

Israel launched a ferocious air assault on Gaza Dec. 27 to disable Palestinian militants and cripple the Hamas movement.

The Israeli military had no immediate comment on the shooting at the U.N. aid vehicle. U.N. spokesman Adnan Abu Hasna said the truck was heading toward the Erez border crossing to pick up supplies and had coordinated the delivery with Israel.

"We've been coordinating with them (Israeli forces) and yet our staff continue to be hit and killed," said Chris Gunness of UNRWA, which has been helping Gaza refugees since 1949. he said.

The deaths follow Israel's killing of at least 39 people at a U.N. school where hundreds of people had sought refuge from the relentless air and ground attacks. Israel said its troops were returning fire toward a squad of militants who fired mortars at its troops, then ran toward the school to hide among the refugees.

Two hours after Thursday's shooting on the truck, Israel ordered a three-hour halt in its offensive for the second day in a row to allow aid into the territory. Israeli military spokesman Peter Lerner said 89 trucks of food were unloaded, along with 83,000 gallons (315,000 liters) of fuel.

The two 3-hour breaks in the offensive provided rare windows for Gazans to buy from the dwindling supplies in the shops, and for rescuers to scour the ruins of entire neighborhoods for unreported casualties. Hassanain, the health official, said 20 more bodies were uncovered during Wednesday's mini-truce, in addition to the 35 found Thursday.

Israel had been braced for a resumption of hostilities on its northern border, anticipating that Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon would try to come to the aid of its Gaza ally, Hamas.

Nonetheless, the four rockets that hit the town of Nahariya created panic. "We are all a bit traumatized at the moment," said Sarit Arieli, 44, standing outside the nursing home that had been hit a few hours earlier.

Hezbollah, which fought Israel to a standstill in a 34-day war in 2006 and is now a key faction in the Lebanese government, denied it was responsible for the rockets. Speculation focused on small Palestinian groups, which have rocketed Israel twice since the end of the Lebanon conflict. Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Saniora condemned the attac

BEIRUT, Lebanon – Thousands protesting Israel's ground offensive on Gaza converged Sunday in Beirut and Istanbul as the leaders of the only two Mideast Arab nations to sign peace treaties with Israel demanded an end to the attack.

AP – A Jordanian demonstrator shouts anti-Israeli slogans during a rally protesting the Israeli attacks in

In Yemen, security officials said anti-Israel protesters attacked several Jewish homes in the northern province of Omran, smashing windows and pelting them with rocks. The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media, said at least one Jewish resident was injured among the tiny minority community.

Lebanese police used water hoses to try to push about 250 demonstrators away from the U.S. Embassy in Lebanon's capital. When that failed, they fired tear gas, Lebanese security officials said. A second Beirut protest — a sit-in outside the U.N. building — drew thousands of supporters of Hamas and Lebanon's Islamic Group.

In Turkey, more than 5,000 people held an anti-Israel rally in Istanbul, waving Palestinian flags and burning effigies of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and President George W. Bush. Also in Istanbul, club-wielding police broke up a small demonstration by protesters who hurled eggs at the Israeli Consulate, the private Dogan news agency reported. There were no reports of arrests or injuries.

In Morocco, tens of thousands gathered in the capital Rabat for a peaceful march to protest the Gaza offensive. Police estimated the turnout at 50,000, according to the official MAP news agency. Organizers said the number was bigger, but did not give a precise figure.

Israel's weeklong aerial bombardment of Gaza and the start of the ground offensive Saturday against Hamas have drawn condemnation across the Muslim and Arab world and news coverage of the invasion has dominated Arab satellite television stations.

Thousands in cities from Tehran to Damascus have also taken to the streets to protest the attacks, which have killed about 500 Palestinians and wounded more than 1,600, according to Gaza officials.

In some cases, the protests of the past week were as directed against Arab governments as much as Israel, with many criticizing their perceived inaction or lack of sufficient support of the Palestinians.

On Sunday, the leaders of Egypt and Jordan — the only two Mideast Arab countries to sign a peace agreement with Israel and maintain diplomatic ties — condemned the ground offensive and called for an end to Israel's onslaught in Gaza.

Several hundred Jordanians shouting "death to Israel" protested against the Gaza offensive Sunday in two separate demonstrations in central Amman, the Jordanian capital. The protests were peaceful and police made no arrests.

In parliament, the Jordanian government came under criticism from Islamic opposition lawmakers demanding that it suspend relations with Israel.

"All options are available to assess the relationship with every side, especially Israel," Prime Minister Nader al-Dahabi told parliament during a heated debate.

"We will reconsider relations according to our higher national interests," he said. "We will not remain silent about the situation and the serious deterioration in Gaza and neither about the threat which risks the security of the whole area and its stability."

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who runs his own Palestinian administration from the West Bank, also denounced Israel's ground offensive as "brutal aggression" in his harshest words yet in describing Israel's assault on his Hamas rivals.

Israel says the aim of the operation is to stop the Palestinian militant Hamas group from firing rockets at southern Israeli towns. Hamas is opposed to any peace settlement with Israel and calls for the destruction of the Jewish state.

"This battle will end a (peace) settlement forever," Hamas' representative in Lebanon, Osama Hamdan, told the protesters at the sit-in. "This battle will show who are the men."

Five civilians and one policeman were lightly injured in the clash outside the U.S. Embassy earlier in the day, according to the Lebanese officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

Meanwhile, the leader of Lebanon's militant Hezbollah group, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, discussed the situation in Gaza with visiting chief Iranian nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili, the group's Al-Manar TV said.

Al-Manar did not give further details but said Nasrallah and Jalili, who arrived here Saturday from neighboring Syria, discussed "ways of ending this aggression."

Hezbollah, which is a strong ally of Hamas, possesses a formidable arsenal of rockets and missiles that bloodied Israel during a monthlong war in 2006. Hezbollah has not threatened to join Hamas in its current battle with Israel, but Nasrallah said last week that his men are on alert in case Israel attacks Lebanon.

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip – Thousands of Israeli troops backed by tanks and helicopter gunships surrounded Gaza's largest city and fought militants at close range Sunday, the first full day of an overwhelming ground offensive in the coastal territory.

AP – A Palestinian carries a child into the Shifa hospital in Gaza City, wounded during the Israeli army operation

Israel said it has inflicted a heavy blow against Hamas as it expands a weeklong offensive meant to stop rocket fire on southern Israel. But spiraling civilian casualties among Palestinians fueled an international outcry, even as the U.S. blocked approval of a U.N. Security Council statement Saturday night calling for an immediate cease-fire.

Israel's ground forces moved in after nightfall Saturday following hours of intense, fiery artillery shelling to clear the way, and Hamas warned that its fighters would turn Gaza into an Israeli "graveyard."

Palestinians reported clashes early Monday in eastern Gaza near the border with Israel. Hamas militants fired rocket-propelled grenades and mortars at advancing Israeli tanks. Explosions could be heard in Gaza City as aircraft attacked buildings. There was no immediate word about casualties.

On Sunday, Israeli soldiers fought primarily in open areas in the launching zones used by Gaza's militants to send rockets raining down on Israeli cities. As the troops in three brigade-size formations moved in, residents of those Israeli cities began cautiously emerging from bomb shelters in hopes that the rocket fire would taper off.

Backing up the troops, mobile artillery units fired shells that exploded in veils of white smoke over Gaza's urban skyline. Tanks pushed south of Gaza City as deep as the abandoned settlement of Netzarim, which Israel left along with other communities when it pulled out of Gaza in 2005.

That effectively cut off Gaza City, the territory's largest population center with some 400,000 residents, from the rest of Gaza to the south.

Israel's military chief said Hamas fighters were trying to draw soldiers deeper into Gaza's sprawling, densely packed urban areas, where the military said militants were shielding themselves behind civilians.

"You entered like rats," Hamas spokesman Ismail Radwan told Israeli soldiers in a statement on Hamas' Al Aqsa TV. "Gaza will be a graveyard for you, God willing," he said.

Israeli forces have not yet entered urban areas, said Brig. Gen. Avi Benayahu, the chief army spokesman. He warned, however, that the operation was not a "school trip" and would be long and demanding.

The ground invasion risks turning into intense urban combat, with house-to-house fighting, sniper fire and booby-traps. Hamas is believed to have some 20,000 gunmen and has had time to prepare.

To guard against hidden explosives, Israel's ground forces moved through fields and orchards with bomb-sniffing dogs.

Since the ground assault began, 64 Palestinian civilians have been killed, said Dr. Moaiya Hassanain, a Health Ministry official. The new deaths brought the death toll in the Gaza Strip to more than 512 since Dec. 27. The tally is based on figures from the U.N. and Palestinian health officials as well as a count by The Associated Press.

Five Israelis have been killed since the offensive began. One soldier has been killed in the ground operation and about 40 were wounded, some of them in heavy exchanges of fire near the militant stronghold of Jebaliya, a town on Gaza City's northern outskirts, the army said. Heavy Israeli casualties could undermine what has so far been overwhelming public support for the operation.

At one hospital in the northern village of Beit Lahiya, medics carrying three injured children in their arms rushed them to treatment. One of the children had a blood-soaked bandage wrapped around his head and covering his eyes.

An Israeli shell also struck an ambulance in the town, killing a paramedic, said Marwan Abu Ras, a hospital administrator. The relief organization Oxfam, which said the ambulance belonged to a partner organization, al-Awda Hospital, confirmed the shelling.

An airstrike hit another ambulance belonging to the Hamas-run Health Ministry in Gaza City, killing three other paramedics, said medic Jamal Hawajiri. That ambulance crew was driving to a Hamas training site where there were reports of wounded.

An Israeli army spokesman said he had no information on the incidents.

The Israeli army said it had killed dozens of armed Hamas gunmen, but Gaza officials could confirm only a handful of dead fighters — in part because rescue teams could not reach the battle zones.

Condemnation of Israel's ground operation poured in from the Middle East and Europe.

"The violence has to stop," said EU External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy scheduled talks Monday with Israeli and Palestinian leaders. While blaming Hamas for causing Palestinian suffering with rocket fire that led to the Israeli offensive, Sarkozy has condemned Israel's use of ground troops, reflecting general world opinion. Sarkozy and other diplomats making their way to the region are expected to press hard for a cease-fire.

Israel has four main demands: and end to Gaza rocket fire, a halt to Palestinian attacks, international supervision of a truce and an agreement to stop Hamas from re-arming. Hamas demands a cessation of Israeli attacks and opening of vital Gaza-Israel cargo crossings, Gaza's main lifeline.

U.S. officials maintained their firm support for Israel and squarely blamed Hamas.

Vice President Dick Cheney said Israel "didn't seek clearance or approval from us" before pushing into Gaza.

Sens. Harry Reid and Dick Durbin — the top two Democrats in the chamber — and Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell all described Israel's actions as understandable.

"I think what the Israelis are doing is very important," Reid said. "I think this terrorist organization, Hamas, has got to be put away. They've got to come to their senses."

Israeli President Shimon Peres said that Israel had to push forward and that a cease-fire was pointless without a halt to Hamas rocket fire.

"Well, clearly, if there is somebody (who) can stop terror with a different strategy, we shall accept it," he said on ABC's "This Week."

"We shall not accept the idea that Hamas will continue to fire and we shall declare a cease-fire. It does not make any sense."

Palestinians said the Israeli military broke into broadcasts on the Hamas TV channel, Al Aqsa, appealing to Palestinians not to agree to serve as human shields for the militants. The message read, "Israel is acting only against Hamas and has no interest in harming you."

The ground operation is the second phase in an offensive that began as a weeklong aerial onslaught aimed at halting Hamas rocket fire that has reached deeper and deeper into Israel, threatening major cities and one-eighth of Israel's population of 7 million.

More than 45 rockets and mortar shells fell in Israel on Sunday morning, sending residents scrambling for bomb shelters. Four Israelis were lightly wounded.

In Gaza City, civilians cowered inside as battles raged, while terrified residents in other areas fled in fear. In the southern town of Rafah, one man loaded a donkey cart with mattresses and blankets preparing to flee.

Lubna Karam, 28, said she and the other nine members of her family spent the night huddled in the hallway of their Gaza City home. The windows of the house were blown out days earlier in an Israeli airstrike, and the family has been without electricity for a week, surviving without heat and eating cold food.

"We keep hearing the sounds of airplanes and we don't know if we'll live until tomorrow or not," she said.

Severe damage to Gaza's phone network was pushing the territory closer to complete isolation. The Palestinian phone company Paltel Group said 90 percent of Gaza's cellular service was down, as well as many landlines, because of frequent power cuts and the inability of technicians to reach work sites.

In his first public comments on the operation, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told his Cabinet Sunday that Israel could not allow its civilians to continue to be targeted by rockets from Gaza.

"This operation was unavoidable," he said.

Military intelligence chief Maj. Gen. Amos Yadlin told the Cabinet Hamas was using mosques, public institutions and private houses as ammunition stores, Cabinet secretary Oved Yehezkel told reporters.

Israel approved the mobilization of thousands more reservists in addition to tens of thousands called up on Saturday. Defense officials said the extra forces could enable a far broader ground offensive.

The troops could also be used in the event Palestinian militants in the West Bank or Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon launch attacks, as Hezbollah did in 2006 when Israel was in the midst of a large operation in Gaza.

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip – Israel widened its deadliest-ever air offensive against Gaza's Hamas rulers Sunday, pounding smuggling tunnels and government strongholds, sending more tanks and artillery toward the Gaza border and activating thousands of reservists for a possible ground invasion.

AP – Palestinian protesters kneel behind a barricade as they hurl stones at Israeli troops, not seen, during

Israeli leaders said they would press ahead with the Gaza campaign, despite enraged protests across the Arab world and Syria's decision to break off indirect peace talks with the Jewish state. Israel's foreign minister said the goal was to halt Gaza rocket fire on Israel for good, but not to reoccupy the territory.

Play Video AP – Israeli troops near Gaza, airstrikes continue

With the two-day death toll nearing 300 Sunday, crowds of Gazans breached the border wall with Egypt to escape the chaos. Egyptian forces, some firing in the air, tried to push them back into Gaza and an official said one border guard was killed.

Hamas, in turn, fired rockets deeper than ever into Israel, near the Israeli port city of Ashdod.

Yet Hamas leaders were forced into hiding, most of the dead were from the Hamas security forces, and Israel's military intelligence chief said Hamas' ability to fire rockets had been reduced by 50 percent. Indeed, Hamas rockets fire dropped off sharply, from more than 130 on Saturday to just over 20 on Sunday. Still, Hamas continues to command some 20,000 fighters.

Israel's intense bombings — some 300 air strikes since midday Saturday — wreaked unprecedented destruction in Gaza, reducing entire buildings to rubble.

After nightfall, Israeli aircraft attacked a building in the Jebaliya refugee camp next to Gaza City, killing a 14-month-old baby, a man and two women, Gaza Health Ministry official Dr. Moaiya Hassanain said. In the southern town of Rafah, Palestinian residents said a toddler and his two teenage brothers were killed in an airstrike aimed at a Hamas commander.

Israeli aircraft also bombed the Islamic University and government compound in Gaza City, centers of Hamas power, and the house next to the residence of Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh in a Gaza City refugee camp. Haniyeh, in hiding, was not home.

Shlomo Brom, a former senior Israeli military official, said it was the deadliest force ever used in decades of Israeli-Palestinian fighting. "Since Hamas took over Gaza (in June 2007), it has become a war between two states, and in war between states, more force is used," he said.

European leaders called on both Israel and Hamas to end the bloodshed.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy spoke Sunday with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who leads a rival government to Hamas in the West Bank, and condemned "the provocations that led to this situation as well as the disproportionate use of force."

The White House was mum about the situation in Gaza on Sunday after speaking out expansively on Saturday, blaming Hamas for provoking Israel's retaliatory strikes.

In the most dramatic attacks Sunday, warplanes struck dozens of smuggling tunnels under the Gaza-Egypt border, cutting off a lifeline that had supplied Hamas with weapons and Gaza with commercial goods. The influx of goods had helped Hamas defy an 18-month blockade of Gaza by Israel and Egypt, and was key to propping up its rule.

Sunday's blasts shook the ground several miles away and sent black smoke high into the sky. Earlier, warplanes dropped three bombs on one of Hamas' main security compounds in Gaza City, including a prison. Moments after the blasts, frantic inmates, their faces dusty and bloodied, scrambled down the rubble. One man, still half buried, raised a hand to alert rescuers.

Gaza's nine hospitals were overwhelmed. Hassanain, who keeps a record for the Gaza Health Ministry, said more than 290 people were killed over two days and more than 800 wounded.

The Palestinian Center for Human Rights, which keeps researchers at all hospitals, said it had counted 251 dead by midday Sunday, and that among them were 20 children under the age of 16 and nine women.

Across Gaza, families pitched traditional mourning tents of green tarp outside homes. Yet the rows of chairs inside these tents remained largely empty, as residents cowered indoors for fear of new Israeli strikes.

Israeli leaders gave interviews to foreign television networks to try win international support.

Public Security Minister Avi Dichter, speaking Arabic, spoke on Arab satellite TV stations, denouncing Hamas rule in Gaza. And Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni told NBC that the assault came because Hamas, an Islamic group backed by Syria and Iran, is smuggling weapons and building a "small army."

In Jerusalem, Israel's Cabinet approved a callup of 6,500 reserve soldiers, raising fears of an impending ground offensive. Israel has doubled the number of troops on the Gaza border since Saturday and also deployed an artillery battery. It was not clear, though, whether the deployment was meant to pressure Hamas or whether Israel is determined to send ground troops.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said it was unclear when the operation would end but told his Cabinet was "liable to last longer than we are able to foresee at this time."

Since Israel's withdrawal from Gaza in 2005, after 38 years of full military occupation, Israeli forces have repeatedly returned to the territory to hunt militants. However, Israel has shied away from retaking the entire strip, for fear of getting bogged down in urban warfare.

The diplomatic fallout, meanwhile, was swift.

Syria decided to suspend indirect peace talks with Israel, begun earlier this year, and the U.N. Security Council called on both sides to halt the fighting and asked Israel to allow humanitarian supplies into Gaza; 30 trucks were let in Sunday.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called on Israel to open its crossings "for the continuous provision of humanitarian supplies." In a statement, he said one Palestinian U.N. employee, and eight trainees, were among the dead.

The prime minister of Turkey, one of the few Muslim countries to have relations with Israel, called the air assault a "crime against humanity."

The carnage inflamed Arab and Muslim public opinion, setting off street protests across the West Bank, in an Arab community in Israel, in several Middle Eastern cities and in Paris.

Some of the protests turned violent. Israeli troops quelling a West Bank march killed one Palestinian and seriously wounded another. A crowd of anti-Israel protesters in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul became a target for a suicide bomber on a bicycle. In Lebanon, police fired tear gas to stop demonstrators from reaching the Egyptian Embassy.

Egypt, which has served as a mediator between Israel and the Palestinians as well as between Hamas and its rival Fatah, has been criticized for joining Israel in closing its borders with Gaza. The blockade was imposed after the Hamas takeover in June 2007.

Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit called on Hamas to renew its truce with Israel. The cease-fire began unraveling last month, and formally ended more than a week ago. Since then, Gaza militants had stepped up rocket fire on Israel.

A Hamas leader in exile, Osama Hamdan, said the movement would not relent. "We have one alternative, which is to be steadfast and resist and then we will be victorious," Hamdan said in Beirut.

Also in Beirut, Hassan Nasrallah, leader of the Hezbollah militia, said he would not abandon Hamas, but did not threaten to attack Israel. During the Israel-Hezbollah war of 2006, the militia fired thousands of rockets into Israel.

Hundreds of thousands of Israelis live in cities and towns in Gaza rocket range, and life slowed in some of the communities. Schools in communities in a 12-mile radius from Gaza were ordered to remain closed beyond the weeklong Jewish holiday of Hanukkah, which ends Monday.

In the southern city of Ashkelon, home to some 120,000 people, streets were relatively busy, despite the military's recommendations against being out in the open.

Several times throughout the day, however, that routine was briefly interrupted by the sounds of wailing sirens warning of an imminent attack. Pedestrians scurried for cover in buildings. After a number of rocket landed in the distance, a woman taking cover nearby briefly fainted. She refused water and food from bystanders, instead shivering in a corner, apparently in shock