GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip -- Six members of the same family and an 18-month-old boy were killed when an Israeli airstrike hit the Jebaliya refugee camp early Thursday, according to Gaza police and health officials. Twenty others were injured in the strike and rescue officials were digging through the rubble of flattened homes, looking for survivors. Israeli troops also fired tank shells that reached parts of the Bureij and Maghazi refugee camps.
The 16-day conflict has claimed the lives of 718 Palestinians, most of them civilians, Palestinian health officials say. Israel has lost 32 soldiers, all since July 17, when it widened its air campaign into a full-scale ground operation aimed at halting rocket fire from Gaza and destroying a sophisticated network of cross-border tunnels. Two Israeli civilians and a Thai worker in Israel have also been killed.
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