IDF troops continued their intense battles against Hamas in the heart of Gaza on Monday, as Israel allowed the expansion of the amount and types of humanitarian aid entering the Strip.

The military said it had taken full control of Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza, arresting Hamas gunmen as its forces advanced in the Shejaiya neighborhood of Gaza City.

Two IDF soldiers were killed Monday fighting in Gaza, the military announced, bringing the toll of troops slain during its ground offensive against Hamas to 129.

The soldiers were named as Cpt. Yarin Gahali, 22, a platoon commander in the Givati Brigade’s reconnaissance unit, from Rehovot; and Cpt. (res.) Netanel Silberg, 33, a team commander in the Combat Engineering Corps’ Yahalom unit, from Na’ama.

Gahali was killed in southern Gaza, while Silberg was killed in the Strip’s north.

Earlier Monday, the IDF announced the deaths of five other soldiers.

The military said Monday that troops in its 252nd Reserve Division had completed operations against Hamas in the Beit Hanoun area of northern Gaza, and handed over responsibility of the region to the Gaza Division, indicating the military has firm control of that sector.

Soldiers eliminated “many terrorists” during the operation in the city, destroyed their weapons depots, rocket launchers, underground command centers, and “significant” tunnels,” the IDF said, capturing all of the Beit Hanoun battalion’s main compounds and strongholds.

Soldiers also uncovered the Beit Hanoun battalion’s main tunnel in the area, which according to the IDF was located deep within civilian infrastructure, between the Beit Hanoun city hall, a mosque, a soccer court, and a daycare center.

Also Monday, the IDF announced that it had arrested a member of Hamas’s elite Nukhba forces and another terrorist who participated in the October 7 massacre in Israel, at a school in Gaza City’s Rimal neighborhood.

The pair, along with several other Hamas members, were captured during a raid on the school on Friday, during which troops of the 401st Armored Brigade killed “many” more operatives, according to the IDF. Those who were caught by the soldiers were questioned by the Military Intelligence Directorate’s Unit 504.

As intense fighting continued in both north and south Gaza, Israel has moved to boost humanitarian aid convoys into the Strip and also allow in commercial goods, the White House said Monday. Israel has downplayed such moves at home, where they are seen as largely unpopular, while seeming to acquiesce to pressure from the US and other countries to do so.

White House National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby said Monday that nearly 200 trucks of humanitarian aid had entered Gaza the previous day, for the first time since last month’s seven-day truce.

The spike in the number of trucks after weeks of far lower numbers is due at least partially to the “significant” decision by Israel to reopen its Kerem Shalom Crossing for deliveries for the first time since the start of the war, Kirby added.

Eighty trucks entered Gaza through Kerem Shalom alone on Sunday, while the other 120 or so trucks entered Gaza through Egypt’s Rafah Crossing.

US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said Monday: “We hope to see this channel solidified and expanded over the coming days.

“It is a critical step toward improving the lives of the Palestinian people in Gaza that we see not just humanitarian aid delivered, but also commercial goods that can be sold in stores and markets,” he said.

“While this weekend’s breakthroughs [regarding aid] are important, they are by themselves not sufficient,” he continued. “We will continue to work closely with the governments of Israel, Egypt, and partner countries in the region to further increase the humanitarian assistance flowing into Gaza to address the needs of the Palestinian people.”

Kirby also said Monday that no deal for a pause in the Gaza fighting and a release of the hostages was “imminent,” but added that the US was working toward this goal on a daily basis, with CIA chief William Burns currently in Warsaw for meetings with Israeli and Qatari counterparts, and that the issue was at the top of US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan’s agenda when he was in Israel last week.

Visiting US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said repeatedly Monday in meetings with Israeli officials that securing the release of the remaining hostages in Gaza was a top priority, and he was slated to visit Qatar himself after he departs Israel.

Israel launched its war against Hamas after the terror group’s murderous rampage through southern Israel on October 7, in which it killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, many in their homes and more than 350 at a music festival, also taking some 240 others hostage.

The Hamas-run Gaza health ministry said Monday that the death toll in the Strip had passed 19,450 since the start of the war, a figure that cannot be independently verified. Israel has suggested the number is largely accurate, but about one third of them are Hamas operatives, and the figure also includes those killed in failed Palestinian rocket attacks.

Israel says it is making an effort to avoid harm to civilians while fighting a terror group embedded within the civilian population. It has long accused Gaza-based terror groups of using Palestinians in the Strip as human shields, operating from sites, including schools and hospitals, which are supposed to be protected.

The IDF said Monday that it had killed some 600 Hamas operatives in the Shejaiya neighborhood of Gaza City in the past two weeks, as troops in its Golani Infantry Brigade engaged in “intense fighting” with the Hamas battalion based there.

The Golani troops have also located and destroyed more than 10 tunnel shafts in the neighborhood, the IDF said, and seized weapons and intelligence materials found in the homes of Hamas operatives and located and destroyed dozens of rocket launchers.

The commander of the Golani Brigade, Col. Yair Palai, said his forces “will do everything so that the residents of the [Israeli border communities] and the south can return to their homes, and so that Hamas does not rule Gaza anymore.”

“This neighborhood was and still is an established stronghold of the Hamas terror organization, and this is a problem that needs to be uprooted,” he added.

Also Monday, troops of Golani Brigade’s 13th Battalion captured Palestine Square in Shejaiya, and destroyed a Hamas monument there commemorating a deadly attack on an armored personnel carrier during the 2014 Gaza War.

“We are here, the 13th Battalion, at the place where the terrorist organization Hamas erected a statue glorifying the disaster that happened to the battalion in [Operation] Protective Edge. We are sending a clear message to Hamas: Wherever such a statue is erected, we will come and destroy it,” said the new commander of the 13th Battalion, Lt. Col. Yuval Mazuz, in remarks provided by the IDF.

Mazuz replaced Lt. Col. Tomer Grinberg, who was killed in action last week.

In the 2014 war, seven Golani soldiers were killed when their APC was hit in fighting in Shejaiya. The remains of one of the seven, Sgt. Oron Shaul, were captured by Hamas and are still in its possession.

After the deadly incident, Hamas erected a monument of a large fist punching through an APC, holding three dog-tags, one of which has the name of Shaul.

The IDF said Golani’s 13th Battalion and troops of the 188th Armored Brigade captured the square — from which Hamas also paraded released hostages several weeks ago — and destroyed the monument.

On the home front, Israel worked toward returning life to normal, as Hamas rocket fire from the Strip has decreased dramatically in recent weeks. On Monday, the IDF Home Front Command announced that the southern coastal city of Ashkelon — which was heavily battered by rockets in the first months of the war — and the surrounding Lachish area can resume in-person schooling, work, and other activities.

Despite growing international pressure on Israel to agree to a ceasefire in Gaza, government and military officials have repeatedly stated that they intend to continue fighting until the operation’s goals are achieved, namely the elimination of Hamas and the return of all the hostages.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reiterated on Monday in comments to Austin that Israel is committed to “achieve total victory against Hamas.”

Times of Israel staff contributed to this report.