Israel bombs Gaza, seeking Hamas targets

The violence broke out after a Palestinian sniper killed an Israeli soldier on the border, unleashing “wide-scale” Israeli air attack.

JERUSALEM — The conflict between Israel and Hamas escalated in Gaza on Friday after a Palestinian sniper killed an Israeli soldier along the border fence and Israel responded with what its military described as “a widescale attack” against Hamas military targets.

Successive explosions rocked Gaza City at nightfall, and streets emptied as warplanes struck sites that Israel said belonged to the military wing of Hamas, the Islamic group that controls Gaza. The Israeli assault on sites across the Gaza Strip was the fiercest since an Egyptian-brokered ceasefire ended 50 days of fighting in the summer of 2014.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel and his defense minister, Avigdor Lieberman, arrived at military headquarters in Tel Aviv on Friday night for emergency meetings with top officials, a highly unusual event for the start of Sabbath.

At least four Palestinians were killed by initial Israeli gun and tank fire and in the subsequent airstrikes. The military wing of Hamas said three of the four were members of Hamas.

On the Israeli side of the border, authorities instructed residents to remain close to bomb shelters as they braced for retaliatory rocket fire from Gaza. The military this week placed batteries of its Iron Dome anti-rocket missile defense system in several locations in central Israel.

Brig. Gen. Ronen Manelis, chief spokesman for the Israeli military, blamed Hamas for escalating tensions over the past 3½ months, since the beginning of the Hamas-orchestrated mass protests along the border fence. He said the response to Friday’s shooting of the soldier along the fence would be “very severe.”

Speaking on Israeli television after 8 p.m., Manelis said the Israeli air assault would continue for several hours.

“We’re prepared for a broad array of scenarios and possibilities,” he said, adding, “We are determined to restore security and the sense of security to the Gaza periphery.”

The protests have since evolved into escalating exchanges of Palestinian mortar and rocket fire against Israeli positions and civilian border communities, and waves of Israeli airstrikes against Hamas targets in Gaza.

Israelis’ nerves have also been frayed by a plague of wildfires set by flaming kites and balloons launched from Gaza into southern Israel, which have charred large tracts of woodland and farmland. One flaming balloon landed in the yard of an Israeli kindergarten this week. It caused no damage or injuries.

Nevertheless, there has been increasing talk of war in recent days, with Israeli leaders warning Hamas they would not tolerate a continuation of the arson attacks.

The friction had already led to two intense bursts of conflict, which ended with hurried efforts by Egypt to restore the cease-fire. In one such episode last weekend, two Palestinian youths were killed in an Israeli airstrike on an otherwise empty shell of a building used by Hamas as a training facility, and four Israelis were wounded as more than 100 mortar shells and rockets were launched from Gaza.

A spokesman for Hamas, Fawzi Barhoum, said Friday that the marches on the border would continue. Israel and Egypt tightly control the movement of people and goods in and out of Gaza, citing security concerns. Barhoum said the protests were aimed at breaking the blockade.

“Our people won’t be broken,” he said, “no matter what the sacrifices.”