Israeli troops kill 7 in Gaza, WB raids

The brief operation just across the frontier in the northern Gaza Strip marked a new Israeli military response to the frequent Palestinian rocket launches at southern Israel.

Witnesses said Israeli commandos backed by a helicopter gunship killed four members of a Palestinian rocket squad as they were about to fire.

At least three of the dead were identified as members of the militant Islamic Jihad group and the fourth man belonged to the Force 17 presidential guard, who witnesses said rushed to the scene with medics to offer aid.

"The fighters were firing rockets into Israel in retaliation for the continued Israeli crimes and the assassination of Abu Hamza al-Majzoub in Lebanon," an Islamic Jihad statement said, referring to a car bombing that killed a senior official of the group in south Lebanon on Friday.

An Israeli government source said at the time that Israel had nothing to do with the killing.