Palestinians wheel a wounded child into a hospital after an Israeli air strike in Gaza City November 14, 2012. Palestinians said nine people were killed, including a seven-year-old girl. REUTERS/Mohammed Salem
The top military commander of Hamas, Ahmed al-Jabari, and his companion were killed in a pinpoint airstrike as they were travelling by car down a Gaza street. Israel has launched one of the most ferocious assaults on Gaza since its invasion four years ago, hitting at least 20 targets in aerial attacks.
“We recommend that no Hamas operatives, whether low level or senior leaders, show their faces above ground in the days ahead,” the Israel Defense Forces said in a Twitter message.
Israel calls it the Operation “Pillar of Defense” in response to repeated rocket attacks by Gaza-based Palestinian militants. The Hamas-run Health Ministry in Gaza said the Israeli attacks had killed at least five others besides Mr. Jabari, including a baby and a 7-year-old girl, and had wounded at least 40.
Newly-elected Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi ordered Egypt’s ambassador to Israel to return home, summoned the Israeli ambassador to protest, and called for emergency meetings of both the United Nations Security Council and the Arab League over the Gaza attacks. Egyptian state media said Foreign Minister Mohamed Amr had “warned Israel against the consequences of escalation and the negative reflections it may have on the security and stability of the region.”
Hamas has controlled Gaza since 2007, two years after the Israelis withdrew from the territory captured in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. But Israeli forces went back into Gaza in the winter of 2008-09 in response to what they called a terrorist campaign by Palestinian militants there to launch rockets into Israel. The three-week military campaign killed as many as 1,400 Palestinians, including hundreds of civilians, and was widely condemned internationally.
- You can read LIVE updates of the attack at this link: http://rt.com/news/gaza-israel-hamas-attack-687/
- Shaykh Faraz Rabbani has urged all Muslims to be a concerned believer and offer any assistance, the least of which is du’a for our Muslim brothers & sisters in Gaza. You can read the Prayer for the Oppressed (Dua Nasiri). here: http://sandala.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/
