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Israeli Missiles Kill 2 Hamas Members in Gaza
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Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, bracing for a difficult fight for his Likud party's leadership next week, convened his security cabinet Saturday evening. The cabinet decided against sending ground troops into the strip, according to military officials, but approved the use of artillery and airstrikes against targets inside Gaza. The cabinet also decided to keep the West Bank and Gaza Strip closed, meaning that Palestinians with permission to enter Israel will be unable to do so.
Early Sunday, witnesses said, an Israeli fighter plane bombed an empty Hamas-run school in Gaza City and a helicopter gunship struck targets in Khan Younis. No injuries were reported.
The approved military operations could include assassinations of Hamas operatives, military officials said. Israel pledged to end such so-called targeted killings in February when Sharon and Abbas agreed to a temporary cease-fire that radical Palestinian groups, including Hamas, signed onto a month later. Israeli officials have said Hamas has broken the agreement a number of times, most recently by firing rockets into southern Israel.
"Israel now has double the responsibility to protect its people from Gaza attacks," said Gideon Meir, a senior Israeli Foreign Ministry official. "And the Palestinian Authority appears to have no inclination whatsoever of stopping them."
Israel did not respond after Islamic Jihad -- a smaller radical faction that, like Hamas, refuses to recognize Israel's right to exist -- fired several rockets into southern Israel. No one was injured in the attacks, which Islamic Jihad officials said was a response to an Israeli military operation in the West Bank on Friday that killed three of their fighters near Tulkarm.
But Israeli military aircraft struck Saturday after Hamas launched more than 30 rockets toward the Israeli city of Sderot -- first firing on weapons workshops and warehouses, then two trucks carrying Hamas gunmen and weapons traveling along the newly opened Salahuddin Highway, according to Israeli military officials and witnesses at the scene.
For several hours an Israeli drone aircraft dropped leaflets over northern Gaza, accusing Hamas of firing rockets "to cover its responsibility for the killing of Palestinians at the rally in Jabalya."
Special correspondent Islam Abdel Kareem in Gaza City contributed to this report.
