2 Gaza militants killed as rockets hit Israel

The Islamic militant Hamas group threatened to escalate fighting with Israel after Israeli airstrikes on Saturday killed two gunmen in the Gaza Strip. Meanwhile, Palestinian rocket attacks on Israel wounded one person and damaged a school in the country's south.
 
A military spokesman said Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz convened "an urgent meeting" to discuss ways of dealing with a week of persistent Palestinian attacks. Gaza militants fired over 30 rockets and mortar shells on Saturday alone, bringing the week's rocket tally to more than 150.
 
The military official, who spoke on condition of anonymity in line with regulations, gave no other details about the meeting.
 
The latest flare-up is the most serious in months. Over a million people in southern Israel live in range of the rockets and the Israeli military has advised the residents to make sure they can get to a bomb shelter quickly.
 
Hamas' military wing, the Al-Qassam Brigades, vowed to escalate the fighting.
   
"If the last rounds were not enough to deliver the message ... we are ready to crush the enemy and to curb its arrogance and to respond to aggression in a strong way," the group said in a statement released Saturday afternoon.
    
On Saturday morning, an Israeli airstrike killed a Palestinian militant as he rode his motorcycle in Gaza. Two other airstrikes wounded 17 Palestinians, including militants and civilians, and damaged several buildings used by Hamas, which rules the coastal territory.
    
The Israeli military said it hit "terror sites" and that it holds Hamas accountable for any attacks originating from the Gaza Strip.
     
Israeli airstrikes and Palestinian rocket attacks continued throughout the day.  A second Gaza militant was killed later in the afternoon, Gaza health officials said. The Israeli military said it had "targeted a terrorist in the northern Gaza Strip while he was preparing to launch rockets at Israel."
     
Also, an Israeli was seriously wounded when a Gaza rocket smashed through a factory roof. Rockets from Gaza also hit a school in the Israeli border town of Sderot. The school was closed for the weekend so no one was hurt but the building was damaged. Several other Israelis were injured in Palestinian rocket attacks this past week.
     
The spike in violence began on Monday when two gunmen infiltrated into Israel along its border with Egypt's Sinai peninsula and killed an Israeli Arab construction worker who was part of a crew building a border security fence meant to avert such attacks. Later, a little known al-Qaida-inspired group, the Mujahedeen Shura Council of Jerusalem, claimed responsibility for the attack and identified the gunmen as an Egyptian and a Saudi.
    
Since then, Gaza gunmen have fired barrages of rockets and mortar rounds at Israel, wounding several Israelis and damaging apartment buildings. Israel responded with airstrikes on militant targets that gave killed at least 9 Palestinians and wounded more than 20 so far.
     
Meanwhile, Gaza health official Ashraf Al Kedra said a boy was killed in a playground during an airstrike Saturday morning in Khan Younis. The Israeli military said they didn't attack that area.
     
Military spokeswoman Lt. Col. Avital Leibovich later called the allegation a "false rumor" and said that according to intelligence information, the boy was killed by "ordinance belonging to one of the terror groups." Palestinian rockets often misfire and explode inside Gaza.
     
The latest escalation has drawn in militants from Hamas, which rules the territory but has largely refrained from attacking Israel since a war more than three years ago. Other Palestinian groups persisted with rocket assaults and other attacks on Israel during that time.

AP