Israelis kill three in air strikes on Hamas

ISRAEL unleashed three air strikes within four hours yesterday, killing two Hamas members and a bystander and destroying two suspected weapons warehouses of the Islamic militant group.

The attacks, which also wounded 23 Palestinians, came a day after militants fired eight homemade rockets into Israel from Gaza.

A Palestinian ambush in the West Bank killed three Israeli soldiers and wounded a fourth yesterday.

Yesterday’s strikes marked one of the most intense series of air raids in the past three years of fighting.

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s adviser, Raanan Gissin, said yesterday’s air strikes were part of Israel’s war on terrorism. “We will chase the terrorists everywhere,” he said. “They will have no sanctuary.”

In the first strike, Israeli warplanes bombed a building under construction where the Israeli military says Hamas was storing homemade Qassam rockets.

Eleven Palestinians were hurt in the bombing, including two children aged two and three. The alleged weapons workshop was near the house of Islamic Jihad leader Abdullah Shami, who was not hurt.

After the air strike, two masked men were seen loading items from the damaged building into a white pickup truck. Less than three hours later, the truck was hit by two missiles fired from an Israeli helicopter.

The two Hamas members in the truck and a bystander were killed, and 12 Palestinians were hurt, including four who were in serious condition.

The pickup had stopped at a traffic light near a petrol station on a busy street crowded with schoolchildren when the missiles hit the front of the vehicle. A kindergarten and an elementary school had just let out students for the day.

In the third attack, a missile destroyed a one-room house on the outskirts of Gaza City. A second missile demolished a car parked nearby.

The car’s passengers apparently fled before the missile hit, witnesses said.

Also yesterday, US officials confirmed that John Wolf, the head of the team monitoring implementation of the troubled US-backed ‘road map’ peace plan, was not planning to return to the region soon. Mr Wolf left for the US last month.