Israel presses Gaza assault

GAZA CITY: Militants defied a major Israeli bombing campaign across Gaza on Thursday, firing off volleys of rockets which killed three Israelis and sparked panic in Tel Aviv.

As Palestinian deaths from relentless air strikes rose to 16, Defence Minister Ehud Barak gave the go-ahead for 30,000 reservists to be called up, with the army saying it was “in the process of expanding the campaign.”

Among eight Palestinians killed on Thursday were five militants, two children and a teacher at a United Nations-run school, medics and a UN official said.

In a surprise move, Egyptian Prime Minister Hisham Qandil visited Gaza on Friday, as Washington urged Cairo to use its influence to try to halt the violence.

But Gaza's ruling Hamas movement remained defiant, ruling out talk of a truce even as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned he was ready to “significantly expand” the campaign, codenamed Operation Pillar of Defence.

“In the past 24 hours, Israel has made it clear that it will not tolerate rocket and missile attacks on its civilians. I hope that Hamas and the other terror organisations in Gaza got the message,” he said after three Israelis were killed and 19 wounded as rockets pounded the south.

As sirens wailed across Tel Aviv, television images showing people running for cover as others lay on the ground outside the defence ministry, their hands over their heads.

Israeli news networks said it was the first time rockets had been fired at Tel Aviv since the 1991 Gulf War, when the city was hit by Iraqi Scud missiles.

“The firing towards Gush Dan and the extent of the general (rocket) fire toward Israel is an escalation,” Barak said in a statement.

The Israeli military said in a statement it had targeted around 70 rocket-launching sites in the space of an hour.

With much of Gaza in darkness because of scheduled power outages, the streets were almost empty, with just a few people out stocking up on food and medicine as the confrontation showed no sign of ending.

Also on Thursday, Hamas militants said they had hit an Israeli drone with a surface-to-air missile east of Gaza City, a claim dismissed by the army.

AFP