Rockets have streamed out of Gaza as Israel pounded the territory with air strikes in the most severe outbreak of violence in the Middle East since the 50-day war in 2014.
Gaza’s Hamas rulers and other militant groups have fired hundreds of rockets that have at times overwhelmed Israel’s missile defences, causing explosions and air raid sirens to echo across Tel Aviv and other cities.
Israeli air strikes have levelled two apartment towers in the Gaza Strip, where two million Palestinians have lived under a crippling Israeli-Egyptian blockade since Hamas took power in 2007.
Warning shots have allowed civilians to evacuate the buildings, but the material losses will be immense. Israel faced heavy criticism over this tactic during the 2014 war.