US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has held another telephone call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his spokeswoman said, after Israel’s army launched an intensified offensive in Gaza, AFP reports.

The call, which was their second in just three days, comes after Israel insisted its stepped-up campaign was aimed at “the defeat of Hamas” and fresh strikes killed more than two dozen.

Rubio and Netanyahu “discussed the situation in Gaza and their joint efforts to secure the release of all remaining hostages”, the secretary of state’s spokeswoman Tammy Bruce said in a statement.