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Gaza strike kills top Hamas figure
Rayyan is the most senior Hamas leader killed since Israel began its aerial offensive [AFP]
A senior leader of the Palestinian Hamas movement has been assassinated in an Israeli air assault on Gaza as speculation grows that a ground offensive is imminent.
Nizar Rayyan is the most senior Hamas official killed since Israel unleashed its massive bombardment on Gaza, in what Israel argues is a response to persistent Hamas rocket attacks from the enclave.
Israeli aircraft went on to bomb sites near the southern Rafah border and open ground near the boundary in the north.
Meanwhile the Israeli army has begun clearing landmines along the Gaza border, apparently laying the groundwork for an invasion of the strip.
Medics say 13 members of Rayyan's family, including his wife and three children, were killed in the attack on his five-storey home in the Jabaliya refugee camp on Thursday.
In depth
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A senior leader of the Palestinian Hamas movement has been assassinated in an Israeli air assault on Gaza as speculation grows that a ground offensive is imminent.
Nizar Rayyan is the most senior Hamas official killed since Israel unleashed its massive bombardment on Gaza, in what Israel argues is a response to persistent Hamas rocket attacks from the enclave.
Israeli aircraft went on to bomb sites near the southern Rafah border and open ground near the boundary in the north.
Meanwhile the Israeli army has begun clearing landmines along the Gaza border, apparently laying the groundwork for an invasion of the strip.
Medics say 13 members of Rayyan's family, including his wife and three children, were killed in the attack on his five-storey home in the Jabaliya refugee camp on Thursday.
In depth
Focus
Latest updates on the Gaza raids
Opinion: Israel's failure to learn
Gaza Diary: Destroyed memories
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No let up in assault on Gaza
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About 30 people were wounded and surrounding buildings badly damaged.
Hamas officials hit back at Israeli after the attack saying Israel's assault on Gaza would fail.
"The blood of Sheikh Nizar Rayyan and the blood of other martyrs will never be wasted and the enemy will pay a heavy price for the crimes it has committed," Hamas official Ayman Taha said.
Rayyan, 51, had refused to take security precautions despite Hamas figures being at risk of assassination. He held a PhD in Islamic studies and lectured at the Islamic University in the Gaza Strip.
Ayman Mohyeldin, Al Jazeera's correspondent in Gaza, said the killing of Rayyan comes at a time when international organisations are saying Israel's policy of bombing the homes of Hamas leaders is against international law.
"While they may be targeting senior members of the factions and military wings, these organisations say there is no doubt that there are families there and they are in residential neighbourhoods," he said.
Palestinian children are taken to hospital after Israel's attack in the refugee camp [Reuters]"As we have seen in this particular strike, it was a direct hit in the heart of the Jabaliya camp, the most densely populated in Gaza, home to 70,000 Palestinians."
At least 420 people have been killed and 2,100 injured since Israel's aerial bombardment of the coastal strip started six days ago.
The UN has said at least 25 per cent of the dead are civilians.
The 1.5 million people living in Gaza are unable to flee the bombardment as crossing points remain closed for most of the time. However, about 200 Gazans chose to re-enter the strip after being stuck in Egypt when the Rafah crossing was briefly opened on Thursday.
Earlier, Israel launched attacks from drones, manned aircraft and navy vessels on a number of buildings in Gaza, including the parliament building and the justice ministry.
Palestinian officials said attacks on government offices left four people dead and at least 25 people injured.
Meanwhile, at least 10 rockets were fired from Gaza into southern Israel.
The Israeli town of Beer-sheva, which lies about 40km from the boundary, was hit and the Israeli army said one rocket hit a residential building in the port city of Ashdod - more than 30km from Gaza. No Israelis were injured.
UN failure
With international pressure mounting on both sides to agree a ceasefire, the UN security council failed to agree on the wording of a draft resolution to end the violence at an emergency meeting held late on Wednesday in New York.
A musician entertains Israeli troops massed near the Gaza Strip [AFP]The special session followed calls from Arab countries for an urgent resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire, and warnings from aid agencies that the people of Gaza are facing a humanitarian catastrophe.
The attempt to draft a resolution failed after the US and the UK requested that the document should be amended to mention Hamas rocket attacks against Israel.
The US has said any lasting ceasefire is dependent on concrete assurances from Hamas – in terms that are acceptable to Israel – that the rocket attacks will stop.
Israel has so far rejected calls for a ceasefire.
It has described itself as being at "all-out war" with Hamas - the Palestinian faction that has controlled the Gaza Strip since a fragile six-month ceasefire between the two sides came to an end on December 19.
Israel says the current operation is aimed at destroying the ability of Palestinian fighters in Gaza to launch rocket attacks on Israeli towns and cities.
Alan Fisher, reporting for Al Jazeera from the Israeli side of the Erez crossing, said Israel continued to mass troops and tanks along its boundary with the Gaza Strip, prompting speculation it is planning a land invasion.
"If Israel did send troops in and started to lose soldiers ... then I think that public opinion would leap away from this operation very quickly," he said.
While the chances of agreeing a ceasefire appear remote, Fisher said: "It seems it is almost up to the international community to come up with some sort of deal that will allow both sides to walk away."
On Thursday, Israel said it would facilitate the departure of the nearly 400 foreigners present in the Gaza Strip at the request of their respective embassies.
'No crisis'
Tzipi Livni, the Israeli foreign minister, said on a visit to Paris on Thursday that there was "no humanitarian crisis in the Strip, and therefore there is no need for a humanitarian truce," reinforcing her rejection of a French-proposed ceasefire to allow in humanitarian aid.
"Israel has been supplying comprehensive humanitarian aid to the Strip ... and has even been stepping this up by the day," the foreign ministry quoted her as saying according to Reuters.
However, Karen Abu Zayed, the commissioner for the UN Relief and Works Agency in Gaza, said on Thursday: "In my eight years in UNRWA, the urgency of an appeal for the people here [in Gaza] has never been so acute. I am appalled and saddened when I see the suffering around me."
The UNRWA has made an emergency appeal for $34 million to help the Gaza population.
Hasan Khalaf, the assistant deputy health minister in Gaza, said it was "not a war in Gaza, it is an Israeli massacre".
"There is no comparison between what we have and what [Israel] are doing to us. The international community are standing unable to help us, and yet we know they have been helping Israel for tens of years.
"Even now they are comparing those getting scared in the south of Israel, and those buried under the rubble after having their houses bombarded."
Khalaf said the central hospital in Gaza has been receiving about 250 people per day.
"We received them in surgery, intensive care and the operating room. We had to increase the capacity for operating rooms from six to 12," he said.
"If we run out of supplies, the international community will know very well," Khalaf said. "The International Committee of the Red Cross and the World Bank supply us. They know what shortage we have."
The UN food distribution centre in Gaza, which has been closed for two weeks because of a shortage of supplies after Israel stepped up its two-year blockade of the Strip, is expected to open on Thursday.
Hamas officials hit back at Israeli after the attack saying Israel's assault on Gaza would fail.
"The blood of Sheikh Nizar Rayyan and the blood of other martyrs will never be wasted and the enemy will pay a heavy price for the crimes it has committed," Hamas official Ayman Taha said.
Rayyan, 51, had refused to take security precautions despite Hamas figures being at risk of assassination. He held a PhD in Islamic studies and lectured at the Islamic University in the Gaza Strip.
Ayman Mohyeldin, Al Jazeera's correspondent in Gaza, said the killing of Rayyan comes at a time when international organisations are saying Israel's policy of bombing the homes of Hamas leaders is against international law.
"While they may be targeting senior members of the factions and military wings, these organisations say there is no doubt that there are families there and they are in residential neighbourhoods," he said.
Palestinian children are taken to hospital after Israel's attack in the refugee camp [Reuters]"As we have seen in this particular strike, it was a direct hit in the heart of the Jabaliya camp, the most densely populated in Gaza, home to 70,000 Palestinians."
At least 420 people have been killed and 2,100 injured since Israel's aerial bombardment of the coastal strip started six days ago.
The UN has said at least 25 per cent of the dead are civilians.
The 1.5 million people living in Gaza are unable to flee the bombardment as crossing points remain closed for most of the time. However, about 200 Gazans chose to re-enter the strip after being stuck in Egypt when the Rafah crossing was briefly opened on Thursday.
Earlier, Israel launched attacks from drones, manned aircraft and navy vessels on a number of buildings in Gaza, including the parliament building and the justice ministry.
Palestinian officials said attacks on government offices left four people dead and at least 25 people injured.
Meanwhile, at least 10 rockets were fired from Gaza into southern Israel.
The Israeli town of Beer-sheva, which lies about 40km from the boundary, was hit and the Israeli army said one rocket hit a residential building in the port city of Ashdod - more than 30km from Gaza. No Israelis were injured.
UN failure
With international pressure mounting on both sides to agree a ceasefire, the UN security council failed to agree on the wording of a draft resolution to end the violence at an emergency meeting held late on Wednesday in New York.
A musician entertains Israeli troops massed near the Gaza Strip [AFP]The special session followed calls from Arab countries for an urgent resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire, and warnings from aid agencies that the people of Gaza are facing a humanitarian catastrophe.
The attempt to draft a resolution failed after the US and the UK requested that the document should be amended to mention Hamas rocket attacks against Israel.
The US has said any lasting ceasefire is dependent on concrete assurances from Hamas – in terms that are acceptable to Israel – that the rocket attacks will stop.
Israel has so far rejected calls for a ceasefire.
It has described itself as being at "all-out war" with Hamas - the Palestinian faction that has controlled the Gaza Strip since a fragile six-month ceasefire between the two sides came to an end on December 19.
Israel says the current operation is aimed at destroying the ability of Palestinian fighters in Gaza to launch rocket attacks on Israeli towns and cities.
Alan Fisher, reporting for Al Jazeera from the Israeli side of the Erez crossing, said Israel continued to mass troops and tanks along its boundary with the Gaza Strip, prompting speculation it is planning a land invasion.
"If Israel did send troops in and started to lose soldiers ... then I think that public opinion would leap away from this operation very quickly," he said.
While the chances of agreeing a ceasefire appear remote, Fisher said: "It seems it is almost up to the international community to come up with some sort of deal that will allow both sides to walk away."
On Thursday, Israel said it would facilitate the departure of the nearly 400 foreigners present in the Gaza Strip at the request of their respective embassies.
'No crisis'
Tzipi Livni, the Israeli foreign minister, said on a visit to Paris on Thursday that there was "no humanitarian crisis in the Strip, and therefore there is no need for a humanitarian truce," reinforcing her rejection of a French-proposed ceasefire to allow in humanitarian aid.
"Israel has been supplying comprehensive humanitarian aid to the Strip ... and has even been stepping this up by the day," the foreign ministry quoted her as saying according to Reuters.
However, Karen Abu Zayed, the commissioner for the UN Relief and Works Agency in Gaza, said on Thursday: "In my eight years in UNRWA, the urgency of an appeal for the people here [in Gaza] has never been so acute. I am appalled and saddened when I see the suffering around me."
The UNRWA has made an emergency appeal for $34 million to help the Gaza population.
Hasan Khalaf, the assistant deputy health minister in Gaza, said it was "not a war in Gaza, it is an Israeli massacre".
"There is no comparison between what we have and what [Israel] are doing to us. The international community are standing unable to help us, and yet we know they have been helping Israel for tens of years.
"Even now they are comparing those getting scared in the south of Israel, and those buried under the rubble after having their houses bombarded."
Khalaf said the central hospital in Gaza has been receiving about 250 people per day.
"We received them in surgery, intensive care and the operating room. We had to increase the capacity for operating rooms from six to 12," he said.
"If we run out of supplies, the international community will know very well," Khalaf said. "The International Committee of the Red Cross and the World Bank supply us. They know what shortage we have."
The UN food distribution centre in Gaza, which has been closed for two weeks because of a shortage of supplies after Israel stepped up its two-year blockade of the Strip, is expected to open on Thursday.
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