A 12-year-old girl and a 17-year-old boy were killed on Saturday night by Israeli gunfire during its ground and air military offensive "Autumn Clouds" in northern Gaza Strip, medics said.

Joma'a al-Saqqa, public information chief at the Shiffa Hospital in Gaza City, said that Esrra Nasser, 12, and Ammar Rezeq, 17, were killed by Israeli soldiers' gunfire in the northern Gaza Strip town of Beit Hanoun.

He said that the killing of the two civilians has raised the death toll of the Palestinians that were killed during the Israeli offensive to 44, while about 200 wounded, 25 of them are in critical conditions.

Dozens of Israeli army tanks, armored vehicles and bulldozers covered by fighting aircrafts began on Wednesday morning a large- scale operation "Autumn Clouds" aiming at reining on militants who launch homemade rockets at Israel.

The ongoing Israeli army offensive was launched after both the political and military establishments' approval.

Israeli soldiers reoccupied the Beit Hanoun town on the north- east borders of the Gaza Strip with Israel, and conducted a house- to-hour search, saying they were searching for militants. Palestinians said more than 100 were arrested.

Meanwhile, spokespersons of the Popular Resistance Committees and two Fatah movement affiliated armed wings told a news conference that the Israeli military operation has failed since it had started and their militants would resume suicide bombing attacks into Israel.

"The Zionist operation would of course fail and would never help in stopping firing rockets at the Zionist entity," said one masked spokesman, adding "military solution would never resolve the issue of the captive (Israeli) soldier in Gaza."

Minister of Foreign Affairs in the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas)-led government Mahmoud al-Zahar also warned in a statement that the continuation of Israeli attacks on northern Gaza Strip " would endanger the life of the captive soldier Gilad Shalit".

Hamas armed wing and two other minor militant groups kidnapped on June 25 the Israeli soldier and still keep him as a hostage, while calling for the release of several hundreds of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails in exchange for the soldier's release.

Source: Xinhua