Israeli planes strike Palestinian interior ministry in Gaza

Palestinian interior ministry which was targeted during an early morning air raid on Gaza City yesterday. This is the second Israeli attack on the ministry causing heavy damage to the building. PHOTO: AFP

In the West Bank, Israeli troops in 15 jeeps surrounded the building in Ramallah where Palestinian parliamentary speaker Aziz al-Dweik lives, a Palestinian security source said.

A medical source said that four people were injured in the attack on the interior ministry which was also hit by an Israel air strike last week, which set the building ablaze.

Israeli air force planes also bombarded a training camp used by the ruling Hamas Islamist movement in the Gaza Strip's southern Rafah district, the security source added, without giving details. Planes also attacked and damaged aHamas-run school in the northern Gaza Strip.

An Israeli spokesman in Tel Aviv confirmed to AFP that Israel air force "planes targeted the interior ministry in Gaza and a Hamas position in the southern Gaza Strip.

The military action came hours after Israel accused Hamas of inciting a grave "escalation in terror," after a homemade rocket struck an Israeli school, and vowed more military action to secure the release of captured 19-year-old army corporal Gilad Shalit.

That attack caused no casualties but marked the first time a Qassam rocket had landed inside the town of Ashkelon, signaling an upgrade in militants' weaponry and sparking fresh words of warning from Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

"This strike on the heart of Ashkelon is a very serious incident which constitutes an escalation of unprecedented gravity in the campaign of terror waged by Hamas, which leads the Palestinian Authority," Olmert said.

Olmert called a meeting of security officials for later Wednesday after having earlier vowed to continue an offensive aimed at freeing the captive conscript.

Following the expiry of an ultimatum set by the corporal's Palestinian captors, Olmert again ruled out any negotiations with militants and promised to strike anyone linked to them, in a thinly veiled reference to Syria.

Israel said the captive soldier remained alive after being seized and wounded ten days ago in a Palestinian raid.

His captors had set a 6:00 am (0300 GMT) Tuesday deadline with demands that Israel release prisoners or "face the consequences".

Israel has sent tanks and troops back into the Gaza Strip for the first time since leaving last September after a 38-year occupation in a bid to free its soldier, leaving the premier staring down the barrel of the worst crisis of his two-month leadership.

The shadowy Army of Islam, one of three groups that claims to be holding Shalit in the Gaza Strip, said Tuesday he would not be killed.