Post by Salem6 on May 17, 2007 14:40:06 GMT
Israeli aircraft have struck a number of targets in Gaza, including a Hamas office, after vowing a severe response to rocket attacks on its soil.
A massive blast shook Gaza City in the Hamas office attack
A top Hamas commander was killed in an attack on a car and an office of the Hamas-run Executive Force was bombed.
The attacks came as efforts to end five days of fighting between rivals Hamas and Fatah, that has left up to 40 people dead, again appeared to fail.
One person was killed on Thursday at a funeral for two Hamas fighters.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, who leads Fatah, suddenly called off a trip to Gaza that had been billed as an effort to shore up the fourth Hamas-Fatah ceasefire in five days.
Officials said he might now travel from Ramallah in the West Bank on Friday.
Suicide bomb threat
An Israeli air strike destroyed the second floor of a two-storey building belonging to the Executive Force, a militia force tasked with maintaining security in Gaza.
One person was killed and about 45 people injured.
Hamas's armed wing threatened to renew suicide bombings in Israel after the air strike.
A second Israeli air strike targeted a car carrying militants in Gaza City, Israel's military said. A Hamas official told Associated Press one senior commander was killed and another wounded.
Israel also confirmed a third strike. Local sources said one Hamas militant was killed in an attack on a housing unit for security guards of a senior Hamas official.
Earlier Israeli tanks moved a few metres into the eastern Gaza Strip, although military officials said there were no plans for a ground attack.
On Wednesday, Israeli air strikes on Hamas facilities in Gaza killed five people, raising fears that Israel was being drawn into the internecine conflict in Gaza.
Palestinian militants later fired a further salvo on the southern Israeli town of Sderot, causing a brief blackout when an electricity transformer was hit.
'Bloodbath'
Fighting between Mr Abbas's Fatah and the Islamist Hamas threatens a hard-won unity government they formed in March.
Gun battles broke out on Thursday morning in the southern Gaza town of Rafah during a funeral march for a slain Hamas man.
Witnesses said militants were firing their weapons into the air - a common practice at Palestinian funerals - when they were fired upon. A pro-Fatah gunman was said to have been killed in the ensuing battle.
Information Minister Mustafa Barghouti - one of the Palestinian cabinet's independent members - described the violence as shameful.
"They keep making agreements, and then they violate it within minutes," he told the BBC.
"When we formed the national unity government, it was formed specifically to prevent internal fighting, and to open the road of protecting democracy."
Mr Abbas had been due to meet Prime Minister Ismail Haniya of Hamas for talks on ending the violence, but sources said he did not want to go until he was sure Hamas was firmly committed to latest ceasefire.
BBC Arab affairs analyst Magdi Abdelhadi says armed supporters on the ground may no longer be paying attention to orders from their political leadership.
news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6664917.stm