Israel has widened its air assault against the Gaza Strip’s Hamas rulers, hitting a mosque it said was hiding rockets, as Palestinians said the death toll from the five-day offensive had risen above 125.

The oldest Palestinian suicide bomber, a 64-year-old widow, lived in a one-room shack and had so many grandchildren that relatives lost track of the number, but her daughter said Fatma Omar An-Najar was driven to lay down her life in an attack on Israelis because one grandson was killed and another disabled in clashes with troops.

Israeli forces today opened fire on a group of women who streamed to a Gaza mosque to serve as human shields for gunmen holed up there, killing one and wounding 10, Palestinian officials and witnesses said.