Israel continued to pound the Gaza Strip from the air on Friday, as Hamas fired more rockets into southern Israel. Both sides are defying a UN call for an immediate cease-fire.

Israeli aircraft struck more than 30 targets before dawn on Friday. There were also constant explosions after first light.

Hamas says one Israeli airstrike killed two of its fighters, while another flattened a five-story building in northern Gaza, killing at least 7 people, including an infant.

By the afternoon, 22 Palestinians were killed, pushing the death toll to 776.

According to Gaza health officials, at least half of those killed in the two-week-old conflict were civilians.

Despite the devastating offensive, Hamas has not stopped firing rockets into southern Israel.

One fell in a street in the southern town of Ashdod. An Israeli bomb squad used a robot to dismantle the unexploded rocket.

13 Israelis so far have been killed since the offensive on Gaza began.

A UN Security Council resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire between Israel and Hamas was overwhelmingly approved on Thursday night, by a vote of 14 to 0, with the United States abstaining.

However, the Israeli government says the military campaign in the Gaza Strip will continue.

It calls the resolution impractical, as Hamas militants continue their rocket and mortar attacks on Israeli territories.

Hamas likewise says it's "not interested" in the ceasefire, because it had not been consulted, and the resolution did not meet its minimum demands.

Meanwhile, Palestinians protesting against the attacks on Gaza clashed with Israeli security forces throughout the West Bank on Friday.

And in the Arab-Israeli town of Baqa el-Gharbiya, hundreds of people took to streets to denounce Israel's military campaign.