Umm Hamid cradles her jaundiced newborn on a bench at the Erez checkpoint between Gaza and Israel, hoping he won't become a victim of what she calls a “forgotten'' war.

“The spotlight is on Lebanon and we are in the dark, but there is so much misery here too,'' said the 31-year-old mother as she tried to enter Israel to take her son to Jerusalem's Hadassah Hospital for liver treatment. “What is to become of us?'' Many of Gaza's 1,4-million inhabitants are asking the same question.

More than 200 Palestinians in Gaza have died since Israel imposed a land, air and sea blockade on the seaside strip on June 28, in response to months of rocket attacks and the abduction of a soldier by Hamas, which controls the Palestinian government.

Hamas is classified as a terrorist group by both the US and Israel.

Battles continue to rage in Gaza even as much of the world's attention is focused on whether the cease-fire between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon will hold. In Gaza as in Lebanon, Israel says it aims to stop missile attacks and deter terrorist attacks from land that it evacuated unilaterally.

Meanwhile, Hamas is gaining support in Gaza as its opponents say the mounting death toll diminishes support for politicians such as Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, considered by Israel a potential negotiating partner.

“The spiraling civilian casualties caused by Israeli actions throughout the region serve to strengthen extremists, weaken peace advocates and exacerbate the conflict,'' Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian peace negotiator, said in a statement.

Along with the death toll, more than 800 people have been wounded in Gaza, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry, which doesn't break down casualties by civilians and fighters.

Israel unilaterally withdrew its military forces from Gaza and demolished Jewish settlements there last year. The militants' “response was terror, terror and terror and terror again,'' Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said last month, citing daily Palestinian missile attacks.

Figures compiled by Israeli police show that nearly 300 Qassam rockets have landed in and around the cities of Sderot and Ashkelon since the beginning of the year. While the number has dropped sharply since the outbreak of hostilities - 108 were fired last month, only 12 so far in August - Israeli experts say that doesn't reflect any lessening of the danger.

“The Palestinian motivation is still high,'' said Yoni Figel, a senior researcher at the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya. “They decide when they want to fire the rockets and on what scale. The threat and challenge for Israel remains the same.''

Israel is firing dozens of shells a day into Gaza and carrying out air strikes against fighters and homes it suspects are used to store weapons. The destruction across Gaza, which is less than half the size of New York City, extends to water mains, bridges, farms and the seaside strip's only power station.

The Israeli army “makes all efforts to avoid harming those not involved in terrorist activities,'' said a military spokeswoman, speaking anonymously under regulation.

In Shoka, a neighborhood of Rafah in southern Gaza, 75-year-old Muhammad Ali al-Mamoun angrily waved a vine of ripened tomatoes and asked why Israeli bulldozers razed the greenhouse he spent 10 years building.

“I am not a terrorist; I have no weapons here,'' said al- Mamoun, surrounded by 19 family members who now live in a nearby tent camp after their makeshift homes were flattened.

“I won't get any compensation. Nobody cares what happens to us here.''

Sheikh Mansour Braika, the Hamas mayor, says more than 320 houses and 520 greenhouses have been damaged or destroyed.

Wadie El-Masri, director of the Piedco Industrial Zone, watched on July 8 as Israeli tanks rolled into the site. When the troops left six days later, he said, they had leveled a palm grove, trashed warehouses and engraved the name of abducted soldier Gilad Shalit on the cement gate with gunfire. El-Masri estimated the damage at about $450 000.

“We are living in a 24-hour nightmare,'' says El-Masri, 45.

“Everywhere you go you feel danger.''

El-Masri has been under pressure since an economic embargo was imposed on the Palestinian Authority by Israel and the US after Hamas, which has claimed responsibility for suicide bombings against civilians, won legislative elections in January.

“We were struggling before but this invasion has really finished us off,'' El-Masri said.

Huda Mahmoud Hammouda, director of the Palestinian State Information Service, a media center affiliated with Abbas, said the conflict is pushing Palestinians toward Hamas and away from Abbas's Fatah movement. ``Israel weakens Abu Mazen every day,'' she said, referring to Abbas by his widely used nickname.

“His words about peace have no meaning in the face of the attacks.''

Gaza factories are shut due to power cuts, fuel shortages and the lack of an outlet for exports via Israel. The Erez and Rafah crossings are closed, preventing thousands of workers from entering Israel. At a third gate, used for goods and aid supplies, Israel is letting through about 15 percent of typical daily traffic, a Palestinian official at the crossing said.

About 70% of Gazans now rely on food aid, according to the United Nations. The UN Relief and Works Agency provides supplies including flour, sugar and milk to about 900 000 people.

“We have no beds, no water for showers,'' said Tisam Said Khamash, who has lived in the Jabalya School in northern Gaza with 36 other families for about nine days.

“My children walk through streets full of waste.''

Samir Ali Kam, 33, an unemployed resident of Jabalya, lost his wife and three of his children last month when a shell hit his home.

“I want to live in peace,'' said Ali Kam, who described himself as “not really interested'' in politics. “But their acts encourage people to take a harder line.'' When asked what the future holds for his 11-year-old son, he said, “I am sure he will grow up and want to fight Jews, but I will tell him not to kill civilians.''

While support for Hamas swells, Palestinian support for Hezbollah, which is backed by Iran and Syria, is also palpable.

Posters of Hassan Nasrallah, leader of the Lebanese Shiite group, are plastered on walls next to images of Palestinian fighters with their homemade Qassam rockets. Nasrallah's image adorns t-shirts in local shops.

Several people being treated at the Shifa hospital in Gaza City proudly declare they are resistance fighters.

“The war may stop in Lebanon, but here it won't,'' said Muhammad Ashafar, 21, who was wounded July 15 in Gaza City when a shell landed between his legs. “We will stand firm and protect our country.''

Israel regularly drops leaflets in neighborhoods it plans to raid, warning residents to flee. Riding instructor Abu Abid al- Mamluk said he received a telephone call from an Israeli military official, telling him to leave his home immediately.

“I thought it was a joke,'' he said as he reached for a cup of Arab coffee. The Israeli army's Web site says Islamic Jihad was storing weapons at his house in al-Shujayia, in eastern Gaza City. Al-Mamluk, who rejects the accusation and has hired an Israeli human-rights lawyer to represent him in court, evacuated his family 27 minutes before the F-16 attack on his home. “This is the price we pay for living in Palestine,'' he said.