"Hamas has no red lines anymore," a group official said Monday afternoon, announcing that the organization would extend its attacks to the West Bank.
A Palestinian man reacts as the injured and dead are brought to hospital following an IAF missile strike in Gaza City, Sunday.
Photo: AP , AP
Until now the group has carried out Kassam rocket attacks only from the Gaza Strip but the official said that this restriction would now be lifted "because of the Israeli attacks on our children."
Earlier, Hamas's armed faction urged its members to refrain from using mobile phones, not to travel in cars and to avoid gathering in public places, for fear of IAF assassination attempts, Israel Radio reported.
Earlier Monday, voices from within Hamas called out loudly for Israel's destruction, following an IAF attack on a Hamas lawmaker's home Sunday night as part of ongoing IDF operations against Kassam rocket fire.
A senior Hamas leader in Gaza declared that it was signed and sealed within his party that Israel would be wiped off the map and replaced by a Palestinian State, Israel Radio reported. He added that rockets and missiles were the means of removing Israel from the picture.
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Meanwhile, a Hamas-affiliated group in the PA parliament called for suicide attacks and other violence against IDF troops in the Gaza Strip in retaliation for the strikes. The organization's armed wing, Izzadin Kassam, threatened the same and warned Sderot residents that even fleeing to Ashkelon would not protect them from rocket attacks.
According to Army Radio, IDF troops operating in Gaza were ordered to keep alert for possible kidnapping attempts or attacks on soldiers.
Fawzi Barhoum, a Hamas spokesman in Gaza, called on the IDF to keep civilians out of the circle of violence. At the same time, he called on Palestinians to attack anything that could be considered Israeli, since, he claimed, it was Israel that declared war on the Palestinians. Barhoum made the comments in an interview with the "Voice of Palestine" radio station.
Eight civilians were killed in an IAF airstrike on Sunday night and Palestinian sources said that the target of the attack was a Hamas parliamentarian's home. Since the IDF began its operations in Gaza last Thursday, 36 Palestinians have been killed.
IDF troops also raided two radio stations and one TV channel identified with Hamas early Monday in the city of Nablus, along with two independent TV stations. The troops confiscated equipment and videotapes, workers at the stations said, and all five went off the air.
AP contributed to this report.
