Israel Air Force fighter pilots attacked a rocket-launching terrorist cell near Gaza City on Sunday immediately following an early morning Kassam attack on the western Negev.
Four senior members of the Popular Resistance Committees (PRC) terrorist group’s Salah al-Din Brigades were killed and six people were wounded in the air strike.
PRC spokesman Abu Mujahed confirmed the kill in a statement, saying, “The occupation has harmed us and is killing our people, and we realize that the war has been reopened and that the enemy must prepare for a response.”
An IDF spokesman said pilots had attacked terrorists as they were placing rockets on launchers.
Rocket Attack Sunday Morning, No Injuries
Earlier, Gaza terrorists launched a double Kassam rocket attack on the western Negev in an apparent response to a warning by Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni less than 12 hours earlier that Israel would protect its citizens.
There were no reports of casualties or damage. Both rockets exploded in open areas near a kibbutz in the Eshkol Regional Council district.
“There are times when Israel must say, ‘Enough is enough,’ she told participants at a conference in Tel Aviv Saturday night. “If Israeli civilians are attacked, Israel will respond in force to protect them,” she said, adding that the government would not tolerate “repeated breaches of the ceasefire.”
The temporary truce, or tahadiyeh (“lull” in Arabic), which is technically set to end on December 19, began on June 19 and has been broken dozens of times since then, although most of the attacks were usually confined to launches of one or two rockets.
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Friday the government would keep the Gaza crossings closed and increase pressure on the Hamas terrorist organization that controls the region to resume the ceasefire. However, he did not specify how that goal would be accomplished.
Truce or Dare from Gaza
The statements came following a 12-day period in which more than 130 mortar shells, Kassams, and Grad Katyusha rockets had been fired at southern Israel. More than a dozen people, including children, suffered from severe emotional trauma and at least one elderly woman was taken to the hospital with shrapnel wounds and a heart attack.
The intensified barrages of rocket fire began after the IDF entered central Gaza to destroy a tunnel that had been dug close to the security barrier for use by terrorists during a planned attack in which they hoped to abduct another Israeli soldier. Kidnapped IDF soldier Gilad Shalit is still being held captive by Hamas terrorists in Gaza since he was abducted during a raid near the Kerem Shalom Crossing, similar to that which intelligence sources warned was imminent.
Following a barrage of 16 rockets and a mortar shell that slammed into southern Israel on Friday, IDF Chief of General Staff Lt.-Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi and Defense Minister Ehud Barak met with senior security staff to discuss the situation.
Little was said coming out of the meeting, other than a brief statement delivered by the Defense Minister, who commented that Israel would consider it a positive sign “if the Gaza factions want to resume the truce.” He warned that if the attacks continue, the response from the Jewish State would be “harsh and painful.”