This week Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and other top officials have been discussing ceasefire prospects and possible broader military action should Egypt's efforts fail.

Israeli tank fire killed a 9-year-old Palestinian girl in the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip on Wednesday, Palestinian medical workers said.

They said the girl's remains had been recovered from a house in the village of Qarara, east of Khan Younis, which had been struck by the tank fire. She was inside at the time of the shelling.

An Israeli military spokesman said a ground force had attacked Palestinian militants in the central Gaza Strip who had been attempting to fire rockets into Israel from a built-up area. He said he was unaware of any civilian casualties.

Israel regularly sends its ground and air forces into Gaza in what the military says is a necessary measure to try and stop cross-border rocket and mortar attacks by Palestinian militants. The Islamist Hamas movement seized control of Gaza a year ago when its fighters routed President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah forces.

Egypt has been trying to broker a truce to end violence on the Israel-Gaza border.