The death toll in the Israel-Hamas war continues to climb as Israeli forces' devastating retaliation for the Palestinian faction's brutal terror attack escalates with a sixth day of airstrikes on the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip. While the toll in Israel from Hamas' bloody rampage crept up, with victims still being identified in small towns along the Gaza border, images from inside the densely packed, completely blockaded Palestinian territory showed many neighborhoods flattened.

The scale of Israel's counterattack led a group of independent experts at the United Nations to warn, while condemning the "horrific" war crimes committed by Hamas, that "indiscriminate military attacks against the already exhausted Palestinian people of Gaza" amounted to "collective punishment," which the group said was "absolutely prohibited under international law and amounts to a war crime."

Israeli officials say Hamas "massacre" discovered at Israeli kibbutz

But as U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Israel in a clear show of support, the expectation was that the war would soon escalate, as Israel's military said it was "preparing" for a widely expected ground offensive in Gaza. Tens of thousands of Israeli forces have massed along both the Gaza border and Israel's northern frontier with Lebanon in recent days, amid fear that another front could open up in the war if the Hezbollah group — based in Lebanon but backed by Iran, just like Hamas — is drawn into the conflict.

In another sign of Israel's war footing, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and senior opposition figure Benny Gantz created a war-time cabinet Wednesday after years of bitter division. Netanyahu said he, Gantz and other Israeli leaders "have put aside every other consideration because the fate of our country is at stake."

As of Thursday morning, Israel's military said Hamas' brutal attack had claimed more than 1,200 lives, including at least 25 Americans, and left some 2,800 people wounded. At least 1,417 people, including 447 children, have been killed in Gaza by Israel's retaliatory strikes, the Gaza Ministry of Health said, adding that more than 6,200 others were wounded.

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