Hundreds of Palestinians with dual nationality waited Monday at Gaza's shuttered Rafah crossing with Egypt, hoping to leave the blockaded enclave where war between Israel and Hamas militants has raged for days.

Both warring parties denied earlier Monday any talks of a humanitarian truce or of opening the border at Rafah, Gaza's only crossing point which Israel does not control.

"We have been at the border for three days," Palestinian-German national Ahmad al-Qassas told AFP. Others said they had waited at the crossing for at least a week.

Egypt and France's foreign ministers urged Monday the delivery of humanitarian aid and the exit of foreign nationals from the bombarded Gaza Strip, on the tenth day of war between Israel and Hamas.

"Those who want to leave Gaza must be able to do so," France's Catherine Colonna said, urging the opening of crossing points.

Egypt controls the Rafah border crossing, the only passage in and out of the Gaza Strip not controlled by Israel.

A US official had told AFP Saturday that Egypt and Israel had reached an agreement for American citizens to leave through Rafah.

Former Finnish president Martti Ahtisaari, who died Monday aged 86, was a mediator who brokered peace around the globe, winning a Nobel Peace Prize for a formidable career spanning over 40 years.

Ahtisaari had battled Alzheimer's disease, which forced him to retire from public life in September 2021.

The former UN diplomat was credited with overseeing the 2005 talks between the Indonesian government and Free Aceh Movement (GAM) rebels, which brought an end to a three-decade conflict in which some 15,000 people were killed.

Israel warned Monday of a long but winning war against Hamas as US Secretary of State Antony Blinken made his second visit within days to promise full support after a major attack.

The top US diplomat, back in Israel after visiting six Arab countries, visibly witnessed the intensifying conflict when air raid sirens went off as he met with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's security cabinet at the defence ministry complex in Tel Aviv.

In Israel's southern Negev desert, Bedouin youth gather near a car hit by a rocket from the Gaza Strip, fearing the war is coming closer to them.

Alaa Abu Jamaa said that he was bringing breakfast to his children at his home in Ararat an-Naqab on the morning of October 7 when Hamas launched an unprecedented assault against Israel.

As soon as he arrived in his car at the door of his home, he was hit by the force of a rocket exploding near him, sending him flying a few metres (several feet) away.

When Rabbi Israel Weiss opens the doors of the refrigerated containers holding the bodies of hundreds of victims of the Hamas attacks the smell is overwhelming, but he said that most of all, he feels the suffering.

The former military chief rabbi came out of retirement to become one of the leaders of an Israeli operation to identify the more than 1,400 dead from the raids by Hamas fighters on October 7 that have plunged the rivals into a new war.

China began welcoming on Monday representatives of 130 countries for a conference that will be overshadowed by the Israel-Hamas war, as an increasingly assertive Beijing is asked to help de-escalate the violence.

At the top of the invitation list to China's Belt and Road Initiative forum is Russia's President Vladimir Putin, on his first trip to a major global power since the Ukraine invasion threw his regime into international isolation.

Any move by Israel to occupy the Gaza Strip again would be a "big mistake," US President Joe Biden said in an interview released on Sunday, as Israeli troops prepared for a ground invasion.

Israel, seeking vengeance for an attack by Hamas on October 7, has declared war on the militant group, launching a relentless bombing campaign and warning more than a million people in northern Gaza to move south ahead of the operation.

Asked by CBS news program 60 Minutes if he would support any occupation of Gaza by the American ally, Biden replied: "I think it'd be a big mistake."

More than 1,000 people demonstrated along Rio de Janeiro's iconic Copacabana beach on Sunday against Hamas as the death toll continued to climb in the conflict between the militant group and Israel.

Demonstrators shouted slogans including "Hamas never again," and "Hamas is terrorism" as they waved Brazilian and Israeli flags and sang in Hebrew at the protest, organized by an Israeli group in Rio.

In the southern Gaza Strip, scores of people line up at bathrooms, many of them not having showered for days after Israel cut off water, electricity and food following Hamas's deadly assault.

Ahmed Hamid, 43, fled Gaza City with his wife and seven children, heading to Rafah after the Israeli army on Friday warned residents of the north of the enclave to head south "for their own safety".

"We haven't showered in days. Even going to the toilet requires waiting your turn in a line," Hamid told AFP.