Israel has widened its range of Gaza bombing targets to civilian institutions with suspected Hamas ties and announced it would hit northern Gaza "with great force" to prevent rocket attacks from there on Israel.

The Gaza-based Islamist group Hamas and president Mahmoud Abbas’s Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) have agreed to a unity pact, both sides announced in a joint news conference yesterday.

Israeli warplanes struck targets in the Gaza Strip today in response to rocket fire toward southern Israel.

Gaza Strip militants vowed today that an Israeli soldier kidnapped five years ago would not “see the light” until Palestinian prisoners held by Israel were released.

Israeli aircraft and ground forces struck Gaza today, killing three Hamas militants and three civilians in a surge of fighting sparked by a Palestinian rocket attack on an Israeli school bus the day before.

Officials in Israel and Gaza said Israeli aircraft have carried out retaliatory airstrikes in the territory after militants launched rockets into Israel.

The Palestinians are ready to end all historic claims against Israel once they establish their state in the lands occupied in the 1967 Six-Day War, President Mahmoud Abbas said.

THE brother of the Palestinian leader assassinated in Dubai has called on the Irish Government to expel the Israeli ambassador from Ireland.

PRIME Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed yesterday to launch an “immediate and powerful response” to any rocket fire at Israel after days of increased tension along the border with Hamas-ruled Gaza.

Israeli warplanes have pounded smuggling tunnels under the Gaza-Egypt border after a Palestinian bomb killed an Israeli soldier.

Palestinian militants fired a volley of rockets into Israel today threatening to reignite violence just hours after a ceasefire had been called.

Israel today announced it was close to ending the bloody fighting it began three weeks ago in Gaza Strip.

Egypt and Hamas are close to a deal for a 10-day ceasefire between Israel and the Palestinian militant group in Gaza, where the death toll from the Israeli offensive exceeded 1,000, officials said.

Israeli ground forces made their deepest foray yet into Gaza’s most populated area, with tanks rolling into residential neighbourhoods and infantry fighting urban warfare in streets and buildings with Hamas militants.

Israel rained bombs and leaflets on Gaza, pounding suspected rocket sites and tunnels used by Hamas militants and warning of a wider offensive despite frantic diplomacy to end the bloodshed.

Israeli forces pounded Gaza from air, land and sea today as a stream of diplomats headed for the region hoping to end the violence.

THE media priority now given to the Israeli targeting of Hamas facilities in Gaza contrasts oddly with that not afforded to the bombardment of Israel with more than 8,000 rockets and mortar shells by Hamas, Islamic Jihad and other armed elements within Gaza over the past eight years.

Israel bowed to international pressure today to allow hundreds of Palestinians with foreign passports to leave besieged Gaza.

Israel warned today it would step up its assault on Gaza until it had smashed the militants of Hamas.

Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair called off a ground-breaking visit to Gaza today in his role as Middle East envoy after a specific warning of an assassination plot.

Four young siblings were killed in an Israeli attack in the northern Gaza Strip, Palestinian medical officials said today.

Israel forces entered a northern Gaza town today and seized a local Hamas leader from his home amid heavy fighting with Palestinian gunmen, the Israeli military and Hamas militants said.

Three Israeli soldiers were killed in a clash with Palestinian gunmen in the Gaza strip today.

Two Israeli civilians were killed by Palestinian gunmen who crossed the border from Gaza before fleeing back there today.

Israeli ground troops pulled out of northern Gaza before daybreak today, following the first extended sweep in their offensive against Palestinian rocket salvos that has left more than 100 dead and led the Palestinian president to call off US-sponsored peace talks.

Gaza was faced with the threat on a full-scale Israeli invasion tonight after a barrage of Palestinian rocket attacks hit border towns.

Six Palestinian militants, including the son of a hardline Hamas leader, were killed in an Israeli air strike today.

Deflecting rising anger over constant rocket attacks after a boy lost a leg, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert today ruled out a broad military operation in the Gaza Strip.

Israeli troops killed six Hamas gunmen and a teacher in the northern Gaza Strip today in escalating violence that is hampering peace efforts.

One of the most wanted Palestinian militants was killed today when an Israeli aircraft attacked a car travelling in the northern Gaza Strip.

Gunmen smashed windows, burned buses and looted computers belonging to a private American school in Gaza before dawn today, an attack officials believed was linked to US President George Bush’s visit to the West Bank earlier this week.

An Israeli airstrike in northern Gaza killed a Hamas militant today who approached the fence separating Israel and Gaza, Hamas said.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas today called for the overthrow of Gaza’s Islamic Hamas rulers in his first explicit demand for their removal.

A Palestinian rocket exploded in an Israeli army base early today, wounding 50 soldiers and drawing Israeli calls for a major military operation against rocket squads in the Gaza Strip.

The Israeli army today said it foiled a 15-year-old Palestinian suicide bomber who tried to attack soldiers operating in the northern Gaza Strip.

Israeli troops and aircraft attacked Islamic militants in the southern Gaza Strip today, killing two Hamas fighters and two civilians, militant factions and Palestinian medical officials said.

A six-year-old girl was killed and six other children injured in a large explosion in northern Gaza today, Palestinian health officials said.

Hundreds of Hamas fighters firing rockets and mortar shells captured the headquarters of the Fatah-allied security forces in northern Gaza, scoring a key victory in the bloody battle for control of the seaside strip.

Hamas and Fatah gunmen traded fire at a hospital in the southern Gaza town of Khan Younis today.

The Israeli and Palestinian leaders today called off a planned summit this week, dealing a new setback to efforts to halt nearly a month of fighting between the Israeli army and militants in the Gaza Strip and restart peacemaking.

Israeli aircraft attacked Palestinian rocket launchers in the Gaza Strip today, the army said, as Israel persisted in its two-week operation meant to stop the crude projectiles.

Israel rounded up more than 30 Hamas leaders in the West Bank including a Cabinet minister, taking its conflict with Hamas over daily Palestinian rocket fire from Gaza to a new level.

Talks are being held today by Israeli and Palestinian leaders today in a bid to determine the future of a ceasefire in Gaza.

In its first attack inside the Gaza Strip in nearly two months, Israeli forces wounded three Islamic Jihad gunmen who were preparing to launch rockets into Israel from northern Gaza today, witnesses and the army said.