Israelis strike at Gaza to halt rocket attacks

Tuesday, July 8, 2014

JERUSALEM -- The Israeli army said it launched an offensive operation early today against the Gaza Strip to quell rocket attacks, and a Palestinian official said Israeli airstrikes injured at least nine Palestinians.

The Israeli airstrikes come after Gaza militants fired dozens of rockets at southern Israel on Monday, setting off air raid sirens and forcing hundreds of thousands of Israelis to stay indoors.

The military rushed more forces to the border late Monday and had warned that such an offensive was likely.

A Twitter statement from the Israeli army said the offensive, dubbed Operation Protective Edge, is intended to "stop the terror Israel's citizens face on a daily basis."

The army said it was carrying out airstrikes in the Gaza Strip early today. It did not elaborate.

Gaza health official Ashraf Al-Kedra said at least nine Palestinian civilians were taken to a Gaza hospital with light to moderate injuries from the airstrikes, including several who suffered from shock. He said some of the injured Palestinians were treated and released.

The latest violence came as Israel pressed forward with its investigation of six Jewish youths suspected of abducting and killing a Palestinian teenager, and Israeli leaders sought to calm an emotional debate over whether the country's politically charged atmosphere led to the crime. An Israeli official said three of the youths had confessed to the attack.

Tensions have been high since three Israeli teenagers kidnapped June 12 in the West Bank were later found dead, followed by last week's slaying of the Palestinian youth in what many suspect was a revenge attack. Throughout the unrest, Gaza militants have launched more than 200 rockets and mortars into Israel, including almost 100 Monday.

Israel has responded with dozens of airstrikes but has not been able to halt the attacks. Eight Palestinian militants were killed in fighting Monday, the highest death toll yet.

The army said at least 70 rockets were fired at Israel from Gaza on Monday, including 40 launched in a single hour after nightfall, setting off air raid sirens up to 50 miles from Gaza, the military said.

Twelve rockets were intercepted by rocket-defense batteries, it added, while the others landed in open areas. It was the deepest penetration of rocket strikes in the current round of fighting.

The army later said that eight more rockets and mortars were fired at Israel from Gaza starting shortly before midnight and into early today, and an additional rocket was intercepted above the Israeli town of Sderot, close to the border with Gaza.

Maj. Gen. Yoav Mordechai, a senior military official, gave an interview in Arabic to Al-Jazeera, warning that Hamas would bear the consequences for the escalation.

Among the dead were six Hamas militants who Israel said were killed in an accidental blast in a tunnel packed with explosives.

Lt. Col. Peter Lerner, an Israel Defense Forces spokesman, said the air force attacked the tunnel a couple of days ago and that when the Hamas militants entered it Sunday night, possibly to use it for an attack on Israeli forces, it collapsed or exploded on them.

Hamas, the Islamic militant group that controls Gaza, vowed revenge, saying "the enemy will pay a tremendous price."

Hamas also called for a mass demonstration Monday night in the West Bank city of Hebron. Hundreds of protesters scuffled with Palestinian Authority security forces and threw stones at them.

The developments were seen as likely to further undermine Hamas' recent reconciliation pact with the more moderate Palestinian Authority leadership based in the West Bank, which has been urging calm rather than protests. Intended to heal a seven-year split between the West Bank and Gaza, the pact resulted in a new government but little else so far.

Lerner said Monday that the army was moving infantry forces to the Gaza border and had received authorization to mobilize up to 1,500 reservists.

In Washington, State Department spokesman Jen Psaki said the U.S. condemns the rocket fire.

"We also support Israel's right to defend itself against these attacks," she said.

U.S. President Barack Obama, meanwhile, urged Israelis and Palestinians to restrain themselves and put an end to acts of retribution in the recent round of violence.

In an op-ed in an Israeli newspaper, Obama called it a "dangerous moment" and lamented the slaying of the four youths.

Obama also praised Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas as committed to peace and security cooperation.

Gag order imposed

The increased rocket fire followed the killing of Mohammed Abu Khdeir, a 16-year-old Palestinian boy from east Jerusalem who was abducted and burned to death last week.

Israeli officials Sunday announced the arrests of six Jewish youths in the killings -- ruling out earlier theories that criminal activity or personal reasons might have been a factor. They said the suspects, including some minors, were from the Jerusalem area.

Abu Khdeir's death triggered several days of violent protests in Arab areas of Jerusalem and northern Israel as Palestinians accused Israeli extremists of killing the boy to avenge the earlier deaths of the Israeli teens.

Israel's Shin Bet agency, which handles top security cases, imposed a gag order, blocking key details, including the identities and backgrounds of the arrested youths, as well as most of the evidence from being made public.

An Israeli official said three of the youths had confessed to the crime and even re-enacted it for authorities. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because of the gag order.

The official said the suspects included two brothers and that one of the suspects is the son of a rabbi. Three minor suspects were allowed to meet with lawyers Monday, while the primary suspects were not.

Naftali Werzberger, a lawyer for one of the suspects, said he didn't even know what his client looked like, adding that the young man was prohibited from receiving details that he is being represented by a lawyer.

"The families are in shock," Werzberger added. "No one among the suspects has a violent past or tendency, and they can't explain how we got to this point where their children were arrested as suspects for acts that are very, very serious."

Despite the gag order, some additional details have begun to emerge.

Israel's Channel 10 TV said the suspects were the son and five grandsons of a prominent rabbi in Jerusalem, without further identifying him. It said two suspects used the rabbi's car for the kidnapping without his knowledge. It added that a Jerusalem District Court presented its suspicions Monday against the suspects, including "belonging to a terror organization." It did not elaborate, and Israeli officials did not confirm the details in the report.

"I am ashamed on behalf of my nation and grieve with you," President Shimon Peres told Abu Khdeir's father, Hussein Abu Khdeir, in a phone call. "The only thing left for all of us to do is to ensure that no more children are murdered and no more tears are shed by mothers."

Peres, a Nobel peace laureate, was among the top Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who reached out to the family in person or by telephone.

Netanyahu, who has condemned Abu Khdeir's death and tried to calm the public, said he had expressed his condolences to the family.

"I would like to express my outrage and that of the citizens of Israel over the reprehensible murder of your son," a statement quoted Netanyahu as saying.

"We acted immediately to apprehend the murderers," he continued. "We will bring them to trial and they will be dealt with to the fullest extent of the law. We denounce all brutal behavior; the murder of your son is abhorrent and cannot be countenanced by any human being."

Rachelle Fraenkel, the mother of one of the slain Israeli teenagers, said that even from the "abyss" of her own pain, she could not describe her distress over the killing of the Arab boy.

"No mother and father should endure what we are going through now. We feel the pain of Mohammed Abu Khdeir's parents," she said.

Also on Monday, Israeli police said a border policeman had been temporarily suspended from special operations and transferred to a different position until the completion of an investigation into the apparent police beating of Tariq Abu Khdeir, a Palestinian-American teenage cousin of the slain Palestinian youth.

Despite his home detention, Tariq Abu Khdeir traveled to the West Bank town of Ramallah to meet Abbas.

In other political fallout, Avigdor Lieberman, Israel's foreign minister and leader of the ultranationalist Yisrael Beiteinu party, broke off his 20-month alliance with the conservative Likud Party led by Netanyahu on Monday, citing "fundamental disagreements" between the two. Lieberman has urged much tougher action against Hamas and Gaza.

Lieberman said he would remain in the governing coalition, for now preventing the government from falling.

Lieberman, however, is no longer required to coordinate his moves with Netanyahu, which could make it more difficult for the prime minister to pass policies through his divided Cabinet.

"It's no secret that differences of opinion lately between me and the prime minister have become substantial and don't permit continuing a joint partnership," Lieberman said.

He said the differences were clear even before elections last year and have worsened.

The two men have recently feuded over how to respond to the wave of rocket fire out of the Gaza Strip. Netanyahu has called for a measured response to the rocket fire, while Lieberman has said he would favor a broad military operation to topple Hamas. Such an operation likely would require a ground invasion of Gaza and could result in heavy casualties on both sides.

Information for this article was contributed by Josef Federman and Daniel Estrin of The Associated Press and by Isabel Kershner, Fares Akram, Said Ghazali and Nayef Hashlamoun of The New York Times.

A Section on 07/08/2014