GAZA CITY (CNN) -- Israel's fourth day of attacks in Gaza sent the Palestinian death toll to more than 375 as the Jewish state's prime minister warned Tuesday that the air offensive marked only the beginning, according to officials.
A Palestinian man surveys a Hamas government compound after an Israeli airstrike Tuesday.
"We are currently at the first stage of the operation," Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told President Shimon Peres during a morning briefing, according to officials.
Olmert's summation came a day after Defense Minister Ehud Barak told Israel's parliament that the campaign launched Saturday marked an "all-out war" against Hamas, the Islamic militant group that rules Gaza.
However, an official in the Defense Ministry said Barak would consider a proposal for a two-day truce to allow humanitarian aid into Gaza. Barak would bring the issue up Tuesday with Olmert, the official said.
Earlier, an Israeli military official denied a truce was in the works, and Mark Regev, Olmert's spokesman, said he was aware of no such proposal.
The Israeli military says it is targeting only Hamas militants, which it says are responsible for a recent barrage of rocket fire into southern Israel. Palestinian parliament member Mustafa Barghouti, however, has called the raids a "war on the Palestinian people" and said the incursion is politically motivated.
Former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said this is not the case and insists Israel is trying to pinpoint militants.
He said of Hamas, "They are committed to our destruction. They're firing missiles at our civilians. They're hiding behind their civilians. That's a double war crime right there."
He declared Israel amid a "grave crisis" and said he believes that "down the line, we'll have to bring down the Hamas regime."
Netanyahu will vie again for the prime ministerial post in February, against Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and Barak, another former prime minister.
The United Nations has called for both sides to end the violence, and U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has roundly condemned both sides -- Hamas for the rocket fire, and Israel for its "excessive use of force" in retaliating.
Three civilians and a soldier have been killed by rockets landing in southern Israel since the campaign began Saturday.
Though Palestinian medical sources say that most of the 375 people killed in Gaza were Hamas militants, U.N. officials said at least 60 civilians were among the dead.
Hamas security sources and Palestinian medical sources said two girls, ages 4 and 11, were killed early Tuesday in an Israeli airstrike as they rode in a donkey-driven cart in Beit Hanoun.
The IDF said it was checking the report.
Israel bombed a Hamas government compound early Tuesday, leveling at least three structures, including the foreign ministry building, eyewitnesses and Hamas security sources said.
A Gaza-based journalist, whose name was withheld for security reasons, said that he heard 18 blasts in the area and that two fires were burning at the compound.
More bombs continued to drop over Gaza throughout the day.
In the Mediterranean Sea, an Israeli patrol vessel struck a boat carrying medical volunteers and supplies to Gaza early Tuesday as it attempted to intercept the vessel, witnesses and Israeli officials said.
CNN correspondent Karl Penhaul was aboard the 60-foot, Gibraltar-registered Dignity when the incident happened in international waters about 90 miles (145 kilometers) from Gaza.
Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor called allegations that the boat was deliberately rammed "absurd" and countered that the volunteer vessel was trying to outmaneuver the Israeli boat.
Despite the blockade and the airstrikes targeting hundreds of Hamas targets, there was no indication of a ground operation in Gaza, but Israel has tanks on the territory's periphery and voted this week to call up 2,000 reserve soldiers.
Israel has allowed dozens of trucks carrying relief supplies into Gaza. Also, the Rafah border crossing to Egypt was opened temporarily Tuesday to allow aid workers and medical supplies into Gaza and to transport injured Palestinians to hospitals in Al Arish, about 19 miles from the border, Egyptian journalist Shahira Amin said.
Doctors in Al Arish said they were treating 36 wounded Palestinians, at least six of whom were critically injured and being transferred to a hospital in Cairo, Egypt, for treatment. More patients were expected to arrive Tuesday, the doctors said.
Militants in Gaza have fired more than 70 rockets and mortar shells into southern Israel since Monday, the IDF reported. At least 180 rockets have been launched into Israel since the campaign began, according to Israeli sources.
On Tuesday, two rockets damaged buildings in Sderot, and a third rocket landed in a cemetery, wounding one person, Israeli medical services and the military reported.
Hamas pledges it will defend its land and people from what it calls continued Israeli aggression. Each side blames the other for violating an Egyptian-brokered cease-fire. The truce formally expired December 19, but it had been weakening for months.
In a statement issued by his office, Peres said the ongoing shelling by Hamas "defies reason and logic, and it doesn't stand a chance."
"There isn't a person in the world who understands what the goals of Hamas are and why they continue to fire rockets," Peres said.
No comments:
Post a Comment