Gaza flare-up threatens to derail peace efforts
> Most serious fighting since 2014 war
GAZA CITY: Palestinian militants kept up their most intense rocket fire on Israel since the 2014 Gaza war yesterday, drawing Israeli air strikes against a Hamas-run television station and other targets.
The flare-up, in which five Palestinians, four of them militants, and a civilian in Israel were killed, threatened to derail efforts by the United Nations, Egypt and Qatar to broker a long-term truce and head off another major conflict in the impoverished enclave.
Hamas, Gaza’s dominant movement, and other armed factions launched more than 400 rockets or mortar bombs across the border after carrying out a surprise guided-missile attack on Monday on a bus that wounded an Israeli soldier, the military said.
Hamas said it was retaliating for a botched Israeli commando raid in Gaza that killed one of its commanders and six other gunmen.
An Israeli colonel was also killed in the incident.
Sirens in southern Israeli towns and the port of Ashkelon sent residents rushing to bomb shelters.
Several homes were hit and the military said Israel’s Iron Dome anti-rocket system intercepted more than 100 rockets and mortar bombs.
Israel responded with dozens of air strikes against Gaza buildings including a Hamas intelligence compound and the AlAqsa Television studios, whose employees had received advance warnings from the military to evacuate.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu convened his security cabinet to discuss Israel’s next moves, and the military said it had sent infantry and armoured reinforcements to the Gaza border.
A statement issued by militant groups in Gaza said Ashdod, a major Israeli port, and Beersheba, the biggest city in southern Israel, would be hit next if Israel did not cease fire. Egypt urged Israel to back down. The United States, whose peace mediation has been stalled since the sevenweek war in 2014, condemned Hamas.
Israeli military spokesman LieutenantColonel Jonathan Conricus said it estimates that Hamas and the Islamic Jihad group have more than 20,000 rockets and mortars of varying calibers and ranges that are capable of reaching Israel’s main cities of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. – Reuters