Blast rocks shopping mall in Israel: 5 dead

The bodies of the five people caught in the blast of a suicide bombing yesterday lay covered on the ground outside the Hasharon shopping centre in the up market resort town of Netanya.. PHOTO: AFP

Ambulances raced to the Sharon shopping centre in Netanya, a seaside city that has been a frequent target of suicide bombings in a five-year-old Palestinian uprising.

"It appears that a person came to the entrance of the mall and blew up," Yisrael Klein, a witness to the blast, told Israel Radio.

Security guards are stationed at the doors of major shopping centres in Israel.

A Reuters witness saw two bodies and the Magen David Adom ambulance service said at least 35 people were wounded, seven of them seriously. Channel 10 television put the death toll at four.

It was the first such bombing since October 26, when a suicide bomber killed six people in the coastal city of Hadera.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the latest attack, which dealt another blow to a ceasefire Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon declared in February.

Earlier Israel put Palestinian militants back in the crosshairs yesterday as it vowed to hit back hard in response to an upsurge in rocket attacks from the Gaza Strip.

As Israeli warplanes buzzed over the territory throughout a sleepless night, Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz ordered a resumption of targeted killing operations as part of a package of measures.

A defence ministry spokesman told AFP that Mofaz had "ordered a harsh response to the rocket attacks, including the assassination of terrorists", reflecting Israeli anger that its pullout of settlers and soldiers from the Gaza Strip over the summer has not brought about an end to the firing.