Drone strike launched at Israeli prime minister's house

A drone has been launched toward the Israeli prime minister's house, the government says, with no casualties reported as Iran's supreme leader vows Hamas will continue its fight despite the death of the mastermind of its deadly attack on Israel.

The strike came as at least 21 people were killed in several Israeli strikes in Gaza, including children, according to hospital officials and an AP reporter.

Sirens wailed on Saturday morning in Israel, warning of incoming fire from Lebanon, with a drone launched toward Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's house in Caesarea, the Israeli government said.

Neither he nor his wife were home and there were no casualties, his spokesperson said in a statement.

Saturday's strikes into Israel come as its war with Lebanon's Hezbollah - a Hamas ally backed by Iran - has intensified in recent weeks.

Hezbollah said on Friday it planned to launch a new phase of fighting by sending more guided missiles and exploding drones into Israel.

The militant group's longtime leader, Hassan Nasrallah, was killed in an Israeli air strike in late September, and Israel sent ground troops into Lebanon earlier in October.

A stand-off is also ensuing between Israel and Hamas, with both signalling resistance to ending the war in Gaza after the death of Hamas' leader Yahya Sinwar.

On Friday, Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said Sinwar's death was a painful loss but noted that Hamas carried on despite the killings of other Palestinian militant leaders before him.

"Hamas is alive and will stay alive," Khamenei said.

Since Israel claimed Sinwar's death on Thursday and a top Hamas political official confirmed the death Friday, Hamas has reiterated its stance that the hostages they took from Israel a year ago will not be released until there is a ceasefire in Gaza and a withdrawal of Israeli troops.

The staunch position pushed back against a statement by Netanyahu that his country's military would keep fighting until the hostages are released, and will remain in Gaza to prevent a severely weakened Hamas from rearming.

Sinwar was the chief architect of the 2023 Hamas raid on Israel that killed some 1200 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapped another 250.

Israel's retaliatory offensive in Gaza has killed more than 42,000 Palestinians, according to local health authorities, who do not distinguish combatants from civilians but say more than half the dead are women and children.

More strikes pounded Gaza on Saturday.

The Palestinian Health Ministry said in a statement that Israeli strikes hit the upper floors of the Indonesian Hospital in Beit Lahiya, and that forces opened fire at the hospital's building and its courtyard, causing panic among patients and medical staff.

At the Awda hospital in Jabaliya, strikes hit the building's top floors, injuring several staff members, the hospital said in a statement.

In central Gaza, at least 10 people were killed, including two children, when a house was hit in the town of Zawayda, according to the al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital where the casualties were taken.

Another strike killed 11 people, all from the same family, in the Maghazi refugee camp, according to the al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al-Balah, where they were taken.

The war has destroyed vast swaths of Gaza, displaced about 90 per cent of its population of 2.3 million people, and left them struggling to find food, water, medicine and fuel.

Sinwar's killing, which appeared to be a chance frontline encounter with Israeli troops on Wednesday, could shift the dynamics of the war in Gaza even as Israel presses its offensive against Hezbollah with ground troops in southern Lebanon and air strikes in other areas of the country.

Israel has pledged to destroy Hamas politically in Gaza, and killing Sinwar was a top military priority.

But Netanyahu said in a Thursday night speech announcing the killing that "our war is not yet ended".

Still, the governments of Israel's allies and exhausted residents of Gaza expressed hope that Sinwar's death would pave the way for an end to the war.

In Israel, families of hostages still held in Gaza demanded the Israeli government use Sinwar's killing as a way to restart negotiations to bring home their loved ones.

About 100 hostages remain in Gaza, at least 30 of who Israel says are dead.