An Israeli drone strike on south Gaza late on Wednesday evening killed five Palestinians, including two children, the enclave's civil defence said.
"Five citizens, including two children, killed and others injured, some seriously, as a result of an Israeli missile strike" in Al-Mawasi, west of Khan Younis, civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP.
The agency said the strike hit near the Kuwaiti Field Hospital in Khan Younis and "targeted" a shelter camp.
The hospital also reported that five people, including two children aged eight and 10, were killed, and another 32 were wounded.
The Israeli military later claimed it had struck a "Hamas terrorist" in southern Gaza in response to a clash with Palestinian fighters in the area that wounded five soldiers. The clashes came against the backdrop of increased Israeli shelling and home demolitions, despite the ceasefire.
A fragile US-brokered ceasefire that came into effect on 10 October has largely halted the fighting between Israel and Palestinian group Hamas.
The Israeli military claimed earlier on Wednesday that during an operation in the area of eastern Rafah, soldiers encountered several fighters"who emerged from an underground terrorist infrastructure".
"During the encounter, an (Israeli) combat soldier was severely injured, two additional combat soldiers and a non-commissioned officer were moderately injured," the military said in a statement.
The second Israeli army statement announcing the air strike did not provide details about the fifth injured soldier.
A security source in Gaza told AFP that at around 4pm local time (1400 GMT), "very heavy artillery shelling took place from occupation vehicles east of Rafah city, along with heavy gunfire from warplanes".
The source added that an Israeli helicopter had also landed in the area.
The military said on Sunday that it had killed more than 40 fighters over the past week in operations targeting tunnels near Rafah, where dozens of Hamas fighters are holed up beneath areas controlled by the Israeli military.
Multiple sources told AFP last week that negotiations were underway regarding the fate of the fighters still in south Gaza's tunnel network.
On Thursday, a prominent Hamas member in Gaza told AFP that the group estimated their number to be between 60 and 80.
Israel's assault on Gaza has killed at least 70,117 people, according to figures from the territory's health ministry.
The ministry says since the ceasefire came into effect, 360 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire. Israel's military has reported three soldiers killed during the same period.