Israel hits Gaza security compound

By Nidal al-Mughrabi

GAZA (Reuters) – Israeli missiles hit a Palestinian
security compound in Gaza on Tuesday, the first such air strike
in two years, and Israeli shells killed a Palestinian in the
north of the strip after rocket attacks on the Jewish state.

Hamas, sworn to destroying the Jewish state, said Israel
was trying through the strikes, which wounded a policeman, to
send a message in response to the Islamic militant group’s
victory in January elections.

Speaking to reporters, Hamas leader and Palestinian Prime
Minister Ismail Haniyeh called the air raids “a serious
escalation.” Israel said it was responding to rocket attacks by
Palestinian militants in Gaza.

Israel launched the strikes shortly after interim Prime
Minister Ehud Olmert announced his centrist Kadima Party
expected center-left Labor to be its senior partner in a
coalition government being formed after elections last week.

Israeli President Moshe Katsav, who holds the power to
appoint a prime minister from among the leaders of elected
parties, is likely to decide on a candidate by Thursday, his
spokeswoman said.

Israel’s YNET News Web site quoted him as saying there was
“no other candidate” than Olmert, who most factions endorsed
during talks with Katsav earlier this week. If appointed prime
minister, Olmert would have 42 days to form a government.

Kadima won the most parliamentary seats, but fewer than
expected, on its plans to lay down Israel’s final borders with
or without Palestinian agreement. It secured 29 seats in the
120-member parliament. Labor came second with 19.

Olmert was elected on a platform of withdrawing from more
West Bank settlements while keeping large ones and setting
Israel’s borders, moves Palestinians condemn as land grabs.

GAZA AIRSTRIKES

Taking a page from Kadima leader and Prime Minister Ariel
Sharon, who lies comatose after a stroke in January, Olmert had
vowed an “iron” response to Palestinian militant attacks in the
lead up to Israel’s March 28 elections.

Israeli media said one of about a dozen projectiles fired
from Gaza militants landed in an industrial area on the
outskirts of the Israeli coastal town of Ashkelon, narrowly
missing a storage area for flammable materials.

The Israeli military said it had carried out two separate
air attacks, one on an open field in northern Gaza from where
militants fire rockets, and the other on an “open, unpopulated
space” in Gaza City.

In the northern Gaza town of Beit Lahiyeh, separate Israeli
fire killed one person and wounded about seven others,
including several in a house, Palestinian security officials
said. One of those wounded in the house was a four-month-old
girl.

An Israeli army spokeswoman said artillery fire targeted
rocket launching sites and did not intend to hit homes.

Earlier, Palestinian witnesses said two missiles fired from
the air struck a training base used by Palestinian security
forces in Gaza City. The office of President Mahmoud Abbas is
nearby, although he was not there at the time.

“There is no justification for these operations. We do not
understand them,” Abbas told reporters in the West Bank city of
Ramallah. “We have appealed to the United Nations, Russia, the
EU (European Union) and our Arab brothers, telling them that
these actions will severely complicate civil life.”

Militants regularly fire rockets from Gaza, which Israel
withdrew from last year after 38 years of occupation. But the
makeshift missiles rarely cause casualties nor are they
launched from Gaza City because they do not have sufficient
range.

(Additional reporting by Allyn Fisher-Ilan and Jeffrey
Heller in Jerusalem)