Palestinian medics have said that Israeli forces have stepped up airstrikes across the Gaza Strip, killing at least 40 people, in further battles with Hamas as Israel braces for potential wider fighting in the region, Reuters reports.

Israeli airstrikes hit a cluster of houses in central Gaza’s Al-Bureij camp, killing at least 15 people, and the nearby Al-Nuseirat camp, killed four, medics said.

Israeli aircraft also bombed a house in the heart of Gaza City in the north, killing five Palestinians, while another airstrike in the southern city of Khan Younis killed one person and wounded others, according to medics.

Later, 15 Palestinians were killed and 30 injured in Israeli bombings of two schools east of Gaza City, the territory’s Civil Emergency Service said in a statement.

Footage circulated on social media, which Reuters could not immediately verify, showed casualties being brought to a hospital on donkey carts.