Israel told residents of the northern Gaza Strip to evacuate their homes, as it prepared to intensify attacks against Hamas and raided a rocket launch site in its first ground offensive of the campaign.
Four soldiers were lightly wounded in an exchange of fire near the rocket site and the troops returned to Israel, the army said. A 74-year-old tourist in Jerusalem died, apparently due to a heart attack during a rocket attack air siren alarm, rescue services said.
After five days of Israeli bombing, the Palestinian death toll exceeded 150. Militants from Hamas and the Islamic Jihad organizations, both considered terrorist groups by Israel, the U.S. and the European Union, continued to fire rockets from Gaza. Rockets were also fired from Lebanon, landing in northern Israel without causing injuries, the army said.
The United Nations Security Council called for a cease-fire, while Egypt said it started talks with Israel and several Palestinian groups to end the crisis. U.K. Foreign Minister William Hague said he’ll discuss cease-fire efforts with his U.S., French and German counterparts when they meet today in Vienna for Iran talks.
Finance Minister Yair Lapid, a member of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s inner security cabinet, said Israel would only be interested in a truce that is long-term and would “dramatically weaken the capabilities of Hamas.” Interviewed on Channel 2 television, Lapid said Israel would escalate its military operations and “raise the bar until Hamas understands it’s not worth it for them.”
New Tactic
In a new tactic, Hamas sent a Hebrew announcement during Israel’s 8 p.m. television news programs that it would fire long-range missiles at Tel Aviv within an hour. As Israelis went to bomb shelters buzzing about the warning, the missiles were launched and tracked live on the TV news. Three were intercepted by the Iron Dome defense system, according to an army text message.
At least 15 Palestinians were killed late yesterday in an Israeli air raid on the Gaza City home of the Hamas police commander, General Tayseer al-Batsh, which also destroyed parts of an adjacent mosque, according to Ashraf al Qedra, spokesman for the Gaza Health Ministry. That brought the number of Palestinians killed to 151 since the Israeli operation started, with more than 1,000 injured, he said in a text message.
Israel said in a statement that Hamas and Islamic Jihad fighters “systematically use mosques to conceal weaponry and establish underground tunnel networks.”
Children Dead
At least 28 children are among the dead in Gaza, the UN aid agency in the region said. The violence is straining the Palestinian health system, and the World Health Organization is appealing for $60 million to help prevent its collapse.
Hundreds of Palestinian civilians were killed and more than 1,000 wounded when Israel last invaded Gaza in January 2009. Israel evacuated the territory in 2005 after a 38-year occupation.
U.S.-brokered peace talks between Abbas’s Palestinian Authority and Israel collapsed in April. Tensions have since been heightened by the killing of teenagers on both sides of the conflict and Israel stepped up its air strikes after weeks of rocket fire intensified.
Netanyahu said the pace of attacks is double that of Israel’s November 2012 operation, also designed to quell rocket bombardments.
More than 809 rockets have been fired from Gaza in the past five days, with at least 150 intercepted by the Iron Dome. Israel has struck about 1,100 targets in the coastal enclave, including tunnels militants dug under the border with Israel, their homes, rocket launchers, command centers and training camps, according to the army.
To contact the reporters on this story: Jonathan Ferziger in Tel Aviv at jferziger@bloomberg.net; Saud Abu Ramadan in Jerusalem at sramadan@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Alaa Shahine at asalha@bloomberg.net Russell Ward
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