Israel Gaza: Air strikes leave four dead in 24 hours

BBC News online - 14 October 2012

These women were mourning a militant killed in Khan Yunis

Three Israeli air strikes on the Gaza Strip have left four people dead, including at least three militants.

One Palestinian was killed and three injured near Deir al-Balah on Sunday, Palestinian medical sources confirmed.

Israel's military said they had targeted a "terrorist rocket squad".

On Saturday evening an air strike killed a Salafist Islamist leader and another militant in Jabalia and, a few hours later, another militant was killed in Khan Yunis.

The Salafist leader killed in Jabalia, Hisham al-Saedni, was hit on a motorcycle. Israel said it was responding to a rocket attack on southern Israel.

Aged 43, Saedni is said to have headed the Mujahedeen Shura Council group.

On Friday, a rocket apparently fired by the same group landed in the courtyard of a residential building in the southern Israeli town of Netivot. No-one was injured.

There has been a flare-up in violence across the border recently, with Palestinian militant groups firing rockets into Israel and Israel carrying out a series of air strikes against targets across the Gaza Strip.

The Israeli military have reported at least five air strikes over the weekend.

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