The first trucks began supplying aid to war-ravaged Gaza from a temporary pier on Friday, the US military said, as fighting raged in the Palestinian territory.

US Central Command said "trucks carrying humanitarian assistance began moving ashore" via the long-awaited pier, a day after it was anchored to a Gaza beach.

"This is an ongoing, multinational effort to deliver additional aid to Palestinian civilians in Gaza via a maritime corridor that is entirely humanitarian in nature," it said.

Strikes in Lebanon blamed on Israel killed four people Friday including two children and a local Hamas official, state media and a source close to the Palestinian group said.

Hezbollah, a Hamas ally, has traded near daily cross-border fire with Israeli forces since the Palestinian group's October 7 attack on southern Israel that sparked the war in Gaza, now in its eighth month.

The Iran-backed Lebanese movement has intensified its attacks in recent days, including using new weapons.

The US military said aid deliveries began Friday via a temporary pier in Gaza aimed at ramping up emergency humanitarian assistance to the war-ravaged Palestinian territory.

"Today at approximately 9 am (0600 GMT), trucks carrying humanitarian assistance began moving ashore via a temporary pier in Gaza," the US Central Command said in a statement, adding that no US troops went ashore.

"This is an ongoing, multinational effort to deliver additional aid to Palestinian civilians in Gaza via a maritime corridor that is entirely humanitarian in nature," it said.

Israel lashed out Friday at South Africa's case before the UN's top court, describing it as "totally divorced" from reality, as Pretoria urges judges to order a ceasefire in Gaza.

A top lawyer for Israel painted the South Africa case as a "mockery" of the UN Genocide Convention it is accused of breaching.

"South Africa presents the court for the fourth time with a picture that is completely divorced from the facts and circumstances," Gilad Noam told the International Court of Justice (ICJ).

Tyson Fury declared himself ready to face Oleksandr Usyk and said he'd pray for his Ukrainian rival before Saturday's undisputed heavyweight clash.

The sometimes madcap Mancunian kept his comments brief in a subdued press appearance on Thursday, two days before what is being billed as the biggest fight this century.

Lennox Lewis, who became the last undisputed heavyweight champion in 1999, sat with Evander Holyfield, the man he beat to unify the belts, in the front row as Fury spoke.

At a field hospital that has become one of Gaza's main trauma centres, a doctor who has worked in a dozen war zones described the situation as the most "catastrophic" he had ever seen.

"It is devastating," said Javed Ali, International Medical Corps's head of emergency response in Gaza.

Speaking to AFP this week from a field hospital northwest of the areas of Rafah ordered evacuated by Israel, he said the situation around the far-southern city was "dire".

Hundreds of lawyers, activists and others demonstrated on Thursday in the Tunisian capital over the arrest of two lawyers in police raids on the national bar association, AFP journalists said.

Protesters gathered near the main courthouse in Tunis as police barred journalists from entering the building at the behest of the prosecutor, reporters were told.

Inside, black-robed lawyers chanted "Freedom!" and "The police state belongs in the past!", according to videos streamed live on social media.

US troops on Thursday anchored a long-awaited temporary pier aimed at ramping up emergency aid to a beach in the war-ravaged Gaza Strip, the US military and Israel said.

The US Central Command said the pier was "successfully affixed to the beach in Gaza" with around 500 tonnes of aid expected to enter the Palestinian territory in the coming days.

"It's a pretty substantial amount, and it's spread out over multiple ships right now," Vice Admiral Brad Cooper, deputy CENTCOM commander, told reporters in Washington.

Egypt, after months of measured condemnation of Israel over the Gaza war, has hardened its tone and formally supported an international case accusing its neighbour of genocide.

Cairo and its state-aligned media have stepped up scathing criticism of Israel over the conflict raging next door, reflecting public anger in the world's most populous Arab nation.

The two countries have also traded blame over the closure of Gaza's Rafah border crossing with Egypt, a crucial lifeline for aid trucks, since Israeli forces and tanks captured the Gaza side last week.

Israel vowed Thursday to "intensify" its ground offensive in Rafah, in defiance of global warnings over the fate of hundreds of thousands of Palestinian civilians sheltering in Gaza's far-southern city.

Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said "additional forces will enter" the Rafah area and "this activity will intensify".

"Hundreds of targets have already been struck and our forces are manoeuvring in the area," Gallant said following a troop visit on Wednesday.