Israel warns of another war on Gaza

Source: PressTV
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=122249§ionid=351020202


The Israeli deputy prime minister has warned that Tel Aviv would soon launch another large-scale military operation against the Palestinians trapped in the Gaza Strip.

Silvan Shalom made the remarks on Friday after Israel carried out a series of airstrikes, injuring three Palestinian children, aged two, four and 11.

The deputy premier said that the new offensive will be launched in the near future.

He added that the military attack is a response to rocket fire from Gaza. A single rocket landed near the Israeli town of Ashkelon on Thursday, causing some damage but no casualties. Hamas did not claim responsibility for the attack.

Israel responded by carrying out six waves of air raids overnight.

Tel Aviv holds Hamas responsible for the ineffective and occasional attacks with home-made rockets that carry little or no explosive warhead.

The rocket attacks by Palestinian groups came after the worst Palestinian-Israeli clashes over the reopening of the Hurva synagogue in East Jerusalem al-Quds.

The Israeli move also led to demonstrations in several Muslim nations.

Hamas Political Bureau Chief Khalid Mashaal, in a telephone conversation with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, said his resistance movement is "not interested in escalating the tension."

He also promised that his organization would take "appropriate measures to prevent the rocket fire from Gaza."

In 2008, Israel launched a large offensive against the coastal strip that killed some 1,400 Palestinians — most of them non-combatants — and a number of Israeli officials face war-crimes charges as a result of the indiscriminate onslaught.