Hamas Shells Sderot in Response to Leader’s Killing

GAZA CITY, September 20 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – Palestinian resistance group Hamas Monday, September20 , fired a string of Qassam rockets at southern occupied towns and Jewish settlements as a “first response” to the assassination of one of its senior military leaders by Israel.

One rocket was fired at the southern town of Sderot at8 : 15(05: 15GMT), but caused not casualties.

Sderot is located south of what has been known as Israel since1948 . It has come recently under almost daily rocket attacks by Hamas.

“We pledge to launch more rocket attacks at usurped Sderot until it is liberated from the Israeli occupation,” Hamas said in a statement.

There is no word yet about the casualties caused by the rocket attack, which came as an immediate reaction to the killing of Khaled Abu Salmieh and injured six others, including a six-year-old boy.

Salmieh, 33 , a member of Ezzudin Al-Qassam Brigades, was killed Sunday, September19 , when his car took a direct hit from a rocket fired by the Israeli aircraft on Al-Jalah Street in the heart of the city, witnesses told Agence France-Presse (AFP).

Earlier, appeals to take revenge for the killing of Khaled Abu Salmieh were read out in mosques across the Gaza Strip.

The Sderot rocket attack came despite a state-of-the-art early warning system set up the Israeli occupation army in the Negev town so that residents can take cover.

Mortar Attacks

Three mortar shells were also fired Monday by Hamas at the “usurped” Morage town in the southern Gaza Strip, Hamas said in a statement released on its website.

Qassam rockets were also fired at Iad Mordechai, Neve Decalim and Netzarim in the Gaza Strip.

Also Monday, a Palestinian man was killed by Israeli army fire near a Jewish settlement in the central Gaza Strip.

Last week, three fighters of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, the military wing of Fatah, were killed in a similar Israeli helicopter strike on their vehicle in the northern West Bank last Monday.

The latest death brought to4 , 321the overall toll since the September 2000 start of the Palestinian Intifada, including3 , 307Palestinians and 943 Israelis, according to an AFP tally.