Gaza militants launched two rockets into southern Israel early today, drawing a threat of military retaliation from Israel’s prime minister and further straining a ceasefire that ended Israel’s devastating Gaza offensive two weeks ago.
There were no casualties from the rockets, though one projectile landed near a kindergarten in a community near Gaza, a police spokesman said.
Israeli aircraft later bombed a Hamas security target in the central Gaza Strip, the Islamist group said. There were no casualties from the attack, which came hours after Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert vowed a "disproportionate" response to rocket and mortar fire from Gaza that injured three Israelis.
A ceasefire was declared on January 18th after the Israeli offensive left 1,300 dead and calls for investigations into civilian deaths.
But today’s rockets, which followed sporadic rocket fire and the killing of an Israeli soldier in a border bombing attack last week, illustrated the difficulties of achieving a complete end to the attacks.
Speaking to his Cabinet today, Israel’s outgoing prime minister, Mr Olmert, said Israel would respond “when and where we choose”.
The government’s position, Mr Olmert said, is that “if there is shooting at residents of the south there will be an Israeli response that will be harsh and disproportionate by its nature to the shooting at residents of Israel and at our forces”.
A spokesman for the Hamas government in the Gaza Strip condemned what he described as Mr Olmert's "aggressive statement".
But the spokesman also urged all Palestinian factions to "respect the national consensus" on the ceasefire the Islamist group declared two weeks ago after Israel announced it was halting the Gaza offensive.
Hamas has not taken responsibility for any of the new attacks, which have been claimed by smaller militant groups. But Israel says it holds Hamas, which has ruled Gaza since taking power in June 2007, responsible for all attacks emanating from Gaza.
The rocket strikes come just over a week before Israel holds a parliamentary election, and could influence the outcome by making the Gaza offensive appear less successful. That could erode support for candidate Tzipi Livni, the foreign minister and one of the leaders behind the operation.
Ms Livni has replaced Mr Olmert as head of the centrist Kadima party and is the only serious challenger to the front-runner, hard-line Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu, according to recent opinion polls.
AP