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AFP | Jerusalem

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Israel intensified its military build-up on Tuesday as reservists began responding to call-up orders ahead of a planned offensive to capture Gaza City, nearly two years into a devastating war.

Despite mounting pressure at home and abroad to end its campaign in the Palestinian territory, Israel is gearing up to seize Gaza's largest city -- intensifying bombardments and oper - ating in the outskirts in recent days.

The United Nations estimates that nearly a million people live in Gaza City and its surroundings, where a famine has been declared.

In a statement, the military said it had been preparing in recent days "ahead of expanded combat operations and the largescale mobilisation of reservists".

Speaking at an event in Jerusalem, Defence Minister Israel Katz said: "Tens of thousands of reservists have left their homes, families and jobs to once again answer the national call -- the return of all hostages and the neutralisation of Hamas."

Approving the military's plans for the conquest of Gaza City in late August, Katz said he had authorised the call-up of about 60,000 reservists.

Israeli media reported that some 40,000 reservists were being called up in the first mobilisation wave.

On the ground in Gaza City, weary Palestinians told AFP they felt helpless and desperate ahead of the looming offensive.

"There is no place for us to go, and no means to get there. We are exhausted physically and mentally from displacement and from the war," 60-year-old Amal Abdel-Aal, who lives in a tent in western Gaza City, told AFP by telephone.

"We have come to wish for death."

In a post on X on Tuesday, the military's Arabic-language spokesman warned Gazans of the upcoming "expansion of combat operations towards Gaza City".

"We wish to remind you that in Al-Mawasi enhanced services will be provided, with an emphasis on access to medical care, water and food," Avichay Adraee said, referring to an area in the south which Israel designated a humanitarian zone in the early months of the war but which has been hit by repeated strikes.

Gaza's civil defence agency said Israeli forces killed at least 56 people on Tuesday, including 10 in an air strike on a residential building in the southwest of Gaza City.

Belgium on Tuesday became the latest Western country to say it will recognise the State of Palestine at the UN General Assembly this month, following similar announcements by Australia, Canada and France.