Israel kept up its bombardment of Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and a political rival announced an emergency government for the duration of the conflict that has already killed thousands.

The veteran right-wing leader was joined by the centrist Benny Gantz, a former defense minister, in the government and war cabinet as both put aside bitter political divisions that have roiled the country and sparked mass protests.

Their joint announcement came after Israeli soldiers sweeping battle-torn southern towns said they had found a total of 1,200 bodies, mostly civilians slain in the Hamas fighters' onslaught, the worst attack in Israel's 75-year history.

Israel's military also confirmed there are 2,700 wounded.

Gaza's health ministry reported at least 1,100 people killed and another 5,339 wounded in Israel's withering campaign of air and artillery strikes on the crowded Palestinian enclave, where black smoke billowed into the sky and entire city blocks lay in ruins. 

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Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva called for urgent international action to protect children and civilians in the conflict, urging Hamas to free child hostages and Israel to halt its air strikes.

"Children must never be held hostage, anywhere in the world," Lula wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

"Hamas needs to free the Israeli children who were kidnapped from their families. Israel needs to stop its bombing so Palestinian children and their mothers can leave the Gaza Strip via the Egyptian border," he said. "There needs to be a minimum of humanity in the insanity of war."

Israel has massed forces, tanks and other heavy armor around Gaza in its retaliatory operation against what Netanyahu labeled "an attack whose savagery... we have not seen since the Holocaust."

Israeli strikes kill paramedics and UN staff

Nine United Nations staffers working with the UN Palestinian refugee agency have been killed in air strikes on the Gaza Strip since Saturday, the United Nations wrote on X social media platform.

The Red Cross also said five members of the International Federation of Red Cross (IFRC) network had been killed in the conflict between Hamas and Israel, including four paramedics as ambulances were hit.

U.S. President Joe Biden has pledged to send more munitions and military hardware to its close ally Israel and expressed revulsion at the "sheer evil" of the slaughter of civilians in the unprecedented assault Hamas unleashed since Saturday.

A first U.S. aircraft has delivered "advanced armaments" to southern Israel's Nevatim Airbase, the Israeli army said, declaring that "our common enemies know that the cooperation between our militaries is stronger than ever."

Meanwhile, the U.S. has collected intelligence showing that key Iranian leaders were surprised by the unprecedented attacks on Israel by Hamas, the New York Times reported, citing American officials.

'Israel before anything else'

Amid the crisis that has been called "Israel's 9/11," Netanyahu struck the political deal with Gantz and pledged to freeze for now his government's flashpoint judicial overhaul plan that has sparked an unprecedented wave of mass protests since the start of the year.

However, Netanyahu's extreme-right and ultra-Orthodox Jewish allies will remain in government.

Opposition leader Yair Lapid has not joined the temporary alliance, although the joint statement said a seat would be "reserved" for him in the war cabinet.

"Israel before anything else," Gantz wrote in a social media post while the far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir wrote that he "welcomes the unity, now we must win."

As the conflict has raged, fears have been intense in Israel for the fate of at least 150 hostages - mostly Israelis but also including foreign and dual nationals - being held in Gaza by Hamas. 

The group has claimed that four of the captives died in Israeli strikes and has threatened to kill other hostages if civilian targets are bombed without advance warning from Israel.

Concern has mounted over the worsening humanitarian crisis in war-torn Gaza, where Israel had leveled over 1,000 buildings and imposed a total siege, cutting off water, food and energy supplies for 2.3 million people.

Will Qatar mediate?

Germany called on Qatar to mediate the release of hostages.

"Various actors in the region, including Qatar, must play an important role, because they have channels that we do not have," Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock told MPs.

Qatar, which has hosted a Hamas political office for more than a decade, has provided hundreds of millions of dollars in financial aid to Gaza and previously brokered deals between Israel and Hamas.

On Tuesday, though, Qatari foreign ministry spokesman Majed bin Mohammed Al-Ansari said it was too soon to start arranging talks on a potential prisoner exchange between Israel and Hamas.

The enclave's sole power plant shut down after running out of fuel, Gaza's electricity provider said.

Speaking to Al Jazeera, Hassan Khalaf, the medical director of Al-Wafa Hospital in Gaza City, said hospitals in the besieged enclave are relying on generators, which are not equipped to power many medical devices.

He predicted the generators have only "maximum: a few days," and may be as short as a day or two, amid dwindling fuel supplies resulting from the "complete siege" announced by Israeli Defense Minister Gallant.

Khalaf said there are currently 100 newborn babies relying on medical equipment in Gaza.

The doctor also said there were about 1,100 patients who rely on dialysis machines for survival in Gaza.

No safe passage for refugees

More than 260,000 Gaza residents have been forced from their homes, a UN aid agency said, while the European Union called for a "humanitarian corridor" to allow civilians to flee the enclave's fifth war in 15 years.

Egypt has discussed plans with the U.S. and others to provide humanitarian aid through its border with Gaza Strip but rejects any move to set up safe corridors for refugees fleeing the enclave, Egyptian security sources said.

Israel appeared to be readying for a possible ground invasion of Gaza, but faces the threat of a multi-front war after also coming under rocket attack from militant groups in neighboring Lebanon and Syria.

Israel again struck targets in southern Lebanon, an area controlled by Hezbollah, an ally of Israel's arch enemy Iran.

Israel's efforts to "uproot" Hamas will deter its fighters from carrying out attacks across the world, the country's Intelligence Minister Gila Gamliel told reporters.

"We have to uproot it so it doesn't happen, there won't be any option, even a thought, to others in the world that they could use what happened (in Israel) as a model" for future attacks, Gamliel said.

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