VARIOUS: Israeli Army vows to continue targetting militants in Gaza after more rockets land in Israel.
Record ID:
858803
VARIOUS: Israeli Army vows to continue targetting militants in Gaza after more rockets land in Israel.
- Title: VARIOUS: Israeli Army vows to continue targetting militants in Gaza after more rockets land in Israel.
- Date: 5th December 2005
- Summary: (BN12) JERUSALEM (DECEMBER 4, 2005) (REUTERS) ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER ARIEL SHARON ARRIVING FOR CABINET MEETING ISRAELI DEFENCE MINISTER SHAUL MOFAZ WALKING INTO MEETING
- Embargoed: 20th December 2005 12:00
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- Topics: International Relations
- Reuters ID: LVAE676MMYSVWOV3VML8K7BKKGS0
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- Story Text: Israel vowed on Sunday (December 4) to continue to try to stop Palestinian militants in Gaza from carrying out rocket attacks on nearby Israeli towns. Israeli Chief-of-Staff Dan Halutz called on the Palestinian Authority to do more to stop militants from launching attacks on Israel, but warned that Israel would continue to retaliate if necessary. "We will not accept a constant threat to our villages around Gaza Strip because someone is not taking the controls in his hands and imposing a kind of order in Gaza, and this someone is the Palestinian Authority," Halutz said at a news conference in the Israeli city of Tel Aviv. "If security standards that were agreed will not be kept in Rafah passage we are going to harden the security standards that we are going to impose on Karni, on Erez and of course on the passage from Gaza to Judea and Samaria, via the convoys or other ways," he added, implying that the recent reopening of the border crossings between Gaza and Egypt and Israel might be affected by militants' attacks on Israel. Early on Sunday an Israeli helicopter gunship fired a missile into Gaza city hitting the offices of an Islamic charity and causing damage to the building, Palestinian witnesses said. There were no reports of casualties. Israel initially responded with several barrages of artillery shells at the zone the firing came from and later two missiles were fired from jets at empty ground. No casualties or damage were reported. An Israeli army spokeswoman said Sunday's airstrike was the first aimed at targets in the Gaza strip since October when missiles from Israeli aircraft were fired at targets in Gaza in response to rocket firing by militants into Israel. The Gaza militants said they fired the rockets in response to the killing of a Palestinian man on a fishing boat by an Israeli naval patrol vessel. On Sunday morning Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon convened a weekly cabinet meeting just hours after the missile strikes. Upon arrival at the meeting Israeli Health Minister Danny Naveh said Israel would do everything in its power to halt militant rocket attacks. "The launching of Qassam (rockets from the Gaza Strip into Israel) obviously happened before (the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza) and now is happening after (the withdrawal) and it requires a harsh reaction of the security system in order to make it clear that there is no Israeli weakness," Nave said before entering the cabinet meeting. "I also think that the massage here is clear, that we should not make mistakes such as going for further withdrawals from Judea and Samaria - what some people might want to do after the elections - without ensuring the security interests of the state of Israel," he added. Palestinians in Gaza awoke on Sunday to assess the damage after another night of airstrikes. Sunday's attack was the latest in a series of Israeli strikes which began on Saturday (December 3) following the firing into southern Israel of three rockets by Palestinian militants in Gaza which landed near Israeli population centres.
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