Hamas says Gaza ceasefire reached with Israel

Hamas and Israel appeared to be honouring a ceasefire on Friday that ended an intense flare-up in violence amid Egyptian efforts to negotiate between the two sides.

Israel's military said that no rockets were fired from Gaza at Israel overnight and it conducted no airstrikes in Gaza against Hamas targets.

Israel's government hasn't confirmed the truce.

Hamas' Al Aqsa TV channel reported late on Thursday that the Egyptian-brokered deal had taken hold "on the basis of mutual calm." It was the third such truce in recent weeks.

The deal did not seem to address the deeper issues that have prevented Israel and Hamas from reaching a longer cease-fire arrangement.

Fighters in Gaza fired over 200 rockets at Israel and the Israeli military carried out a similar number of airstrikes in Gaza in the latest round of violence.

Those killed in the Gaza Strip included Enas Khammash, 23, and her 18-month-old daughter Bayan, according to the Hamas health ministry.

Most of the rockets fired by Palestinian fighters landed in open areas, but at least two hit the Israeli town of Sderot and four people were wounded.

A ceasefire earlier on Thursday was broken when a rocket fired from the Gaza Strip landed outside the major Israeli city of Beersheba, causing no damage or injuries.

It was the first time since a 2014 war that a rocket had hit that deep inside Israel, according to Israeli media. Beersheba is some 40 kilometres.

Israel responded by launching an airstrike on the Said Meshal Cultural Centre, flattening the building.

The building was not publicly known to include facilities for Hamas, with 18 people injured in the attack.

The three flare-ups since July, which follow months of tensions due to protests along the Gaza border, have raised fears of a fourth war between the two sides since 2008.

Nickolay Mladenov, the UN envoy for the Middle East conflict who has been seeking to negotiate a long-term truce between Israel and Hamas, said he was "deeply alarmed".

Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas called on the international community to "immediately and urgently intervene".

The Great Return March protests began on 30 March, with at least 165 Palestinians killed by Israeli snipers since they began.

The unarmed demonstrations called for Palestinians to be able to return to the land they or their families fled in the 1948 war surrounding the creation of Israel.