Gaza bloodshed continues

Kerry arrived in Cairo late on Monday to join Ban, who had arrived earlier in the day, in trying to persuade Israel and the Islamist militant group Hamas to end almost two weeks of fighting in the Gaza Strip which has claimed more than 500 lives, the vast majority of whom were Palestinians.

Kerry arrived just hours after US President Barack Obama called on the two sides to end the bloodshed in Gaza.

"We have serious concerns about the rising number of Palestinian civilian deaths and the loss of Israeli lives," President Obama told reporters on the south lawn of the White House. "And that is why it now has to be our focus and the focus of the international community to bring about a ceasefire that ends the fighting and can stop the deaths of innocent civilians, both in Gaza and in Israel."

Obama noted that Israel had the right to protect its citizens against rocket attacks launched by Hamas and other Palestinian militant groups at the Jewish state. However, he also said that the US believed that the Israeli offensive had already inflicted "significant damage" to Hamas' infrastructure.

Later, White House spokesman Josh Earnest told reporters that the president wanted Israel to do more to protect the lives of civilians in Gaza.

Little appetite for peace

Despite the growing calls to end the bloodshed, there was little sign yet from either side of a willingness to agree to a ceasefire.

Hamas' leader in Gaza, Ismail Haniyeh, said in a televised address that the Islamist militant group would not be satisfied until it had ended a seven-year-old blockade imposed by Israel on the Palestinian territory.

"The world must understand that Gaza has decided to end the blockade by its blood and its heroism," Haniyeh said.

Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon, meanwhile, said there was no time limit on the offensive.

"If needed we will recruit more reservists in order to continue the operation as long as necessary until the completion of the task and the return of the quiet in the whole of Israel especially from the threat of the Gaza Strip," he told a parliamentary committee.

More casualties

There were more losses on both sides as fighting in the Palestinian territory continued on Monday.

Among the casualties were four people killed and dozens of others injured when a hospital was hit in the central Gaza town of Deir el-Ballah. The Israeli army said an initial investigation suggested that anti-tank missiles had been stored near the hospital and that these had been successfully targeted.

"Civilian casualties are a tragic inevitability of the brutal and systematic exploitation of homes, hospitals and mosques in Gaza," the army said.

The Israeli Defense Forces also said via Twitter that seven of its soldiers had been killed in the fighting over the past 24 hours. This comes a day after 13 of its soldiers died in the ground offensive.

pfd/slk (AP, Reuters, AFP, dpa)