JERUSALEM: Fighting raged on both sides of Gaza’s borders on Wednesday despite intensified efforts across the region to thrash out a truce to end a week of violence that has cost 136 Palestinian and five Israeli lives.

Diplomatic efforts have involved US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, United Nations (UN) chief Ban Ki-moon and Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi but a deal to end Israel’s offensive on rocket-firing militants in the Gaza Strip remains elusive.

The Israeli military said that during the night it had targeted more than 100 sites across the Gaza Strip, about half of them underground rocket launchers, as well as the internal security ministry and a police compound.

An army spokesman said that since midnight four rockets fired from Gaza had hit southern Israel and a further two were intercepted midair.

The army confirmed its first fatality from rocket attacks on Tuesday, and a civilian contractor working for the defense ministry was also killed, as a longer-range missile landed near Jerusalem and one hit a building in metropolitan Tel Aviv.

Israel’s offensive, launched on November 14 with the targeted killing of a Hamas military chief, claimed the lives of 26 more Palestinians on Tuesday and saw an air strike on an eight storey building housing Agence Framce-Presse’s Gaza City offices, causing no injuries.

Clinton, who flew in Tuesday night for talks with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Clinton, said that Washington’s commitment to Israeli security was “rock solid and unwavering.”

But she stressed that this “is why we believe it is essential to de-escalate the situation” in the Palestinian territory. She also indicated a truce announcement may not emerge until after she completes visits to the West Bank capital of Ramallah and Cairo for talks with Egypt’s President Morsi.

Militant sources in Gaza had initially said that a deal could be announced in Cairo on Tuesday night following days of Egyptian-brokered negotiations between Israel and Gaza’s Hamas rulers.

But Hamas officials said that the indirect negotiations were ongoing, as an Egyptian official told Agence France-Presse in Cairo that “the truce announcement is not expected tonight because we are still waiting for a response” from the Jewish state.

An Israeli diplomatic source told Agence France Presse that negotiations were ongoing.

As they held late night talks in Jerusalem, Netanyahu told Clinton he was ready to agree to a “long-term solution” as long as the rocket attacks from Gaza stopped.

“If there’s a possibility of achieving a long-term solution for this problem by diplomatic means, we prefer it. But if not, I’m sure you understand that Israel will have to take every action necessary to defend its people,” he said.

A senior Hamas official said that a key sticking point was the timing of when Israel would begin easing its six-year blockade of Gaza.

“A compromise solution is for there to be agreement on lifting the siege, and that it would be implemented later at a specified time,” he said.