Israeli planes yesterday renewed airstrikes in Gaza, and Hamas militants responded by firing rockets into Israel as their battle entered a fifth night, and US and Arab diplomats sought an end to the violence.
Palestinian health officials said that at least 12 people were overnight killed in airstrikes throughout Gaza. The officials said that a woman and her three children were among the dead after their house was hit in a refugee camp.
The Israeli military said that it carried out strikes on a Hamas military intelligence facility and a number of rocket launching sites in northern Gaza.
Photo: AFP
The Palestinian Ministry of Awqaf and Religious Affairs said that Israeli planes destroyed a mosque.
A Israel Defense Forces spokesman said that the military was checking the report.
Across the border, sirens sounded throughout much of southern Israel, sending residents running for shelter. In the cities of Beersheba and Ashdod, buildings were struck by rockets. There were no immediate reports of injuries.
With no sign of an end to the fighting, casualties spread further afield, with Palestinian authorities on Friday reporting that 11 people were killed in the occupied West Bank amid clashes between protesters and Israeli security forces.
More than 132 people have since Monday been killed in Gaza, including 32 children and 21 women, and 950 others wounded, Palestinian health officials said.
Among the eight dead in Israel were a soldier patrolling the Gaza border and six civilians, including two children, Israeli authorities said.
Ahead of a UN Security Council session to discuss the situation today, US Deputy Assistant Secretary for Israeli-Palestinian Affairs and Press and Public Diplomacy Hady Amr arrived in Israel on Friday.
The US embassy in Israel said that the aim was “to reinforce the need to work toward a sustainable calm.”
Israel on Friday launched day-long attacks to destroy what it said were several kilometers of tunnels, launch sites and weapons manufacturing warehouses used by the militants in an effort to halt the rocket attacks.
Across central and southern Israel, from small towns bordering Gaza to metropolitan Tel Aviv and southern Beersheba, people have adjusted to sirens wailing, radio and TV broadcast interruptions, and the beeps of cellphones bearing red alerts that send them rushing for cover.
Cross-border hostilities between Israel and Palestinian militants in Gaza have been accompanied by violence in mixed communities of Jews and Arabs in Israel. Synagogues have been attacked and street fights have broken out, prompting Israeli President Reuven Rivlin to warn of civil war.
Egypt was leading regional efforts to secure a ceasefire. Cairo was pushing for both sides to stop the fighting from midnight on Friday pending further negotiations, two Egyptian security sources said, with Egypt leaning on Hamas and others, including the US, trying to reach an agreement with Israel.
The foreign ministers of Egypt and Jordan discussed efforts to end the Gaza confrontation and to prevent “provocations” in Jerusalem, the Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.
“The talks have taken a real and serious path on Friday,” a Palestinian official said. “The mediators from Egypt, Qatar and the United Nations are stepping up their contacts with all sides in a bid to restore calm, but a deal hasn’t yet been reached.”
The United Arab Emirates (UAE) on Friday called for a ceasefire and negotiations while offering condolences to all victims of the fighting, citing the promise of accords in September last year that made the UAE and Bahrain the first Arab states in a quarter century to establish formal ties with Israel.
Hamas, which rules Gaza, on Monday launched the rocket attacks in retaliation for Israeli police clashes with Palestinians near the al-Aqsa Mosque, Islam’s third holiest site, in East Jerusalem.
The Israeli military said that more than 2,000 rockets had been fired from Gaza into Israel since the start of the conflict, with about half of them intercepted by missile defense systems and 350 falling into the Gaza Strip.
Civil unrest between Jews and Arabs in Israel itself dealt a strong blow to efforts by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s opponents to unseat the leader after a series of inconclusive elections, giving rise to expectations that Israelis might go to the polls for an unprecedented fifth time in just more than two years.
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