Israeli tanks infiltrated southern Gaza Strip at dawn on Tuesday, taking control of the Palestinian side of the Rafah crossing on the Egyptian border, in what the army described as a “targeted operation” against Hamas.

The ground incursion in the eastern part of Rafah city came after Tel Aviv stated that the ceasefire proposal put forward by Hamas the previous day did not meet its demands, and announced that it had agreed to proceed with the attack it had long threatened.

An Israeli official told the Times of Israel that it was a “limited operation” aimed at pressuring Hamas to accept the deal.

The Israeli army stated that the 401st Armored Brigade took control of the Gaza side of the Rafah crossing on Tuesday morning, apparently without significant resistance. Footage showed troops raising Israeli flags at the border crossing.

The army clarified that the crossing, located about 3 kilometers (1.8 miles) from the Israeli border, was seized during a “targeted operation” against Hamas in “limited areas east of Rafah.” It lies along what is known as the Philadelphia Corridor, which separates Egypt and Gaza.

Until Tuesday morning, Israel controlled all known land crossings with Gaza.

An Egyptian official and Hamas-affiliated Al-Aqsa channel reported that Israeli officials informed the Egyptians that the troops would withdraw after completing the operation, but no timeline was provided.

The newspaper quoted the Israeli army as saying it had “intelligence information that terrorists are using the crossing area for terrorist purposes.”

On Sunday, Hamas launched rockets from near the crossing towards the Kerem Shalom area in southern Israel, resulting in the death of four soldiers and injuries to others.

The Rafah crossing with Egypt is now cut off from the main Salah al-Din road that connects north and south in Gaza. The Israeli army stated that part of the road east of Rafah was separately secured by the Givati infantry brigade during the nighttime operation.

The Israeli army added that around 20 militants were killed and that the troops discovered three “large” tunnels without providing evidence to substantiate that.

It remains unclear whether Hamas still possesses tunnels extending from the Rafah area into the Egyptian Sinai desert, which it had previously used to smuggle weapons and supplies.

Over the past decade, the Egyptian army has taken strict measures against smuggling tunnels and destroyed hundreds, stating they were used to transport weapons to jihadist groups in Sinai.

The Israeli army also announced it targeted more than 50 Hamas sites in Rafah and bombed them by air during the night. The army mentioned that 50 other sites were bombed in the area late on Monday.

Palestinians reported intense airstrikes in the east of the city during the night, resulting in the deaths of at least 27 people.

Israel has regularly conducted airstrikes in Rafah in recent months, even as it has postponed sending troops amid strong international opposition to military operations in the city, where more than one million Palestinians, most of them displaced, have fled from other areas of the Strip.

After seizing the crossing, the troops on Tuesday searched the area for Hamas infrastructure and prepared for additional missions.

Leaked footage showed Israeli military vehicles moving along the border between Egypt and Gaza, also known as the Philadelphia Corridor, in the eastern part of Rafah, near the seized crossing.

The clip showed an armored personnel carrier carrying two large flags – one Israeli and the other for the 401st Armored Brigade, the unit that seized the Gaza side of the Rafah crossing.

The Israeli army has not taken control of the entire Philadelphia Corridor, which extends for 14 kilometers (8.7 miles) along the border between Gaza and Egypt, as Netanyahu has promised Israel would do.

Israel claims it must control the corridor to prevent arms smuggling to Hamas.

For its part, Egypt warned on Tuesday that the Israeli operation in Rafah jeopardizes ceasefire efforts, according to the Egyptian foreign ministry.

Hamas stated in a statement that the Israeli incursion into the Rafah crossing in Gaza aims to undermine ceasefire efforts and called on the United States and the international community to pressure Israel to halt the “escalation.”

Also on Tuesday morning, Hamas fired several rockets and mortar shells from the city towards the Kerem Shalom area, the site of the attack that took place on Sunday and on the other side of the border from eastern Rafah. The Israeli army stated that no damage or injuries occurred.

Before launching the nighttime operation, the Israeli army said it had “coordinated with international organizations operating in the area, to request movement towards the humanitarian area, as part of the efforts to evacuate the population.”

On Monday morning, Israel issued evacuation orders for about 100,000 Gaza residents in parts of eastern Rafah, who were instructed to evacuate to a designated “humanitarian area” near Khan Younis, north of Rafah.

Hours later, Hamas stated it accepted the Egyptian and Qatari ceasefire proposals and the proposal for releasing hostages, but Israeli officials said that Hamas's conditions did not match what Tel Aviv had agreed upon, although task forces would travel to Cairo on Tuesday to resume indirect talks.

Announcing that Hamas's latest offer was “far from [meeting] Israel's basic requirements,” a statement from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said the war cabinet unanimously decided to proceed with an operation by the Israeli army in Rafah “to exert military pressure on Hamas,” aiming to make progress in the release of hostages and other war objectives.

Netanyahu has pledged for months that Israeli forces would conduct an operation to uproot the last Hamas strongholds in the city of Rafah in southern Gaza regardless of the agreement for the release of hostages. Israeli defense officials state that four of the remaining six Hamas battalions are located in the city, along with members of the movement's leadership and a large number of hostages who were taken from Israel on October 7 during the mass assault carried out by the group.

In a phone call with Netanyahu earlier on Monday, U.S. President Joe Biden reiterated his opposition to a large Israeli military attack in Rafah, according to a statement from the White House, without providing further details.

The United States has repeatedly expressed its opposition to invading Rafah without reliable guarantees from Israel to protect the more than one million Palestinians living there. Israel claims it can evacuate these civilians and provide for them safely, but Washington has not been convinced.

The Biden administration is offering alternatives to a full invasion of Rafah, including bolstering the Gaza border with Egypt and carrying out more targeted operations against Hamas leadership. However, Netanyahu has made the invasion of Rafah a core and non-negotiable element to achieve “total victory” over the terrorist group.

The war erupted after Hamas’s attack on October 7, when militants killed about 1,200 people and took 252 hostages, and in response to the attack, Israel launched a massive assault aimed at eliminating the military and governmental capabilities of the group in Gaza and liberating the hostages, of whom 128 are still in captivity, while more than 34,700 Palestinians have been killed in the conflict, according to health officials in Gaza, a third of them being children and women.