The number of Palestinians killed rises to 96 with hundreds more wounded after six days of air raids, as UN secretary-general calls for ceasefire. And in an op-ed for the Jerusalem Post, Gilad Sharon, the son of former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon writes“We need to flatten entire neighborhoods in Gaza. Flatten all of Gaza.”

AlJazeera:

Three people, including two children, were killed and 30 others were injured in an air raid before dawn on
Monday on a family home in the Zeitoun neighbourhood in Gaza City, medical officials said.
...
Israel bombed 80 locations in Gaza overnight, the military said on Monday, as officials prepared for a ground offensive if talks for a truce fail.
...
Ashraf al-Kidra, a spokesperson of the health ministry in Gaza, said on Sunday that civilians accounted for half of the Palestinian toll.

Gaza health officials said at least 23 children and several women have been killed since Israel's attacks from the air and warships began on Wednesday.

Hundreds of others have been wounded, and Palestinian hospitals are struggling to cope.

The Israeli army said it had fired missiles at more than 1,300 locations in Gaza since Wednesday, and that more than 550 rockets were fired back against Israel. Three Israelis have been killed and a few dozen wounded.

The army said about 300 rockets fired by Palestinian fighters were intercepted by Israel's anti-missile system, the Iron Dome, and at least 99 failed to reach Israel and landed inside Gaza.

In an op-ed, former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s son, Gilad, argues that Israel needs to step up its strikes on Gaza. “We need to flatten entire neighborhoods in Gaza. Flatten all of Gaza,” he writes. “The residents of Gaza are not innocent, they elected Hamas.” He continues with a comparison of the current situation to dropping atomic bombs on the Japanese in World War II. And concludes that “there’s no middle path here.”

A side note, Reuters reports the Israeli government as saying that more than 44 million hacking attempts have been made on its web sites since Wednesday:

Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz said just one hacking attempt was successful on a site he did not want to name, but it was up and running after 10 minutes of downtime.

Typically, there are a few hundred hacking attempts a day on Israeli sites, the ministry said.

Attempts on defence-related sites have been the highest, while 10 million attempts have been made on the site of Israel's president, 7 million on the Foreign Ministry and 3 million on the site of the prime minister.

A video message claiming to be from the hacktivist group, Anonymous, has appeared on the net.

It states: "We will strike any and all websites that we deem to be in Israeli Cyberspace in retaliation for the mistreating of people in Gaza and other areas."

Check back for more on the situation in Gaza later in the day.

Here's the latest on the situation from AlJazeera:

Fresh Israeli air raids have killed at least eight Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and wounded dozens more, medics say, with Palestinian security sources confirming that at least three of the dead were Hamas fighters.

Israel on Saturday expanded its fierce air assault on rocket operations, striking Hamas government and security compounds, tunnels and electricity transformers after an unprecedented rocket attack on Friday aimed at the holy city of Jerusalem raised the stakes.

The Israeli army said that four of its soldiers were injured by a rocket fired from Gaza. Meanwhile, a newly installed battery of Israel's Iron Dome defence system successfully intercepted a Gaza rocket aimed at Tel Aviv on Saturday.

Palestinian medics said 40 Palestinians have been killed and 345 wounded since Israel launched the aerial campaign against the Palestinian enclave on Wednesday.

In the same period, three Israelis have been killed and 18 injured, including 10 soldiers.

Since the start of its operation, Israel's army said it carried out some 700 airstrikes. It also said that fighters have fired more than 580 rockets over the border, 367 of which hit southern Israel, and 222 of which were intercepted by the Iron Dome anti-missile system.

Also now at AlJazeera, breaking news banners read "Israeli air strike hits main gaza police headquarters and prime minister ismail haniyeh's office," and "Israeli cabinet approves plan to call up 75,000 reserve soldiers as air strikes continue on the gaza strip," with no further details as yet.