Children killed as Gaza violence flares

JERUSALEM (CNN) -- Israel's defense minister Thursday told his country "to ready for escalation" as it continued to pummel Gaza with airstrikes in response to rocket attacks from militants in the Palestinian territory.

"The big military operation is actual and concrete," Ehud Barak said. "We are not eager for it [but] are not deterred by it."

At least 20 Palestinians were killed in 10 airstrikes in Gaza on Thursday -- 10 militants and 10 civilians, according to Palestinian medical and security sources.

Four of the dead were children, killed in a single airstrike on Jebalya refugee camp in northern Gaza, the sources said.

Another airstrike hit a police station near the Gaza City home of Hamas leader Ismail Haniya, according to Palestinian security sources.

Haniya was not home at the time of the attack, which killed one Hamas militant and injured three, the sources said.

The Israeli military confirmed the strike, saying it was targeting a group of Hamas militants west of Gaza City.

The Israeli military maintains it is targeting sites where rockets are built and launched as well as other militant areas. Almost 90 rockets have struck the Jewish state since Wednesday, killing one Israeli in southern Israel and wounding several others.

The latest round of violence began Wednesday morning when an Israeli airstrike targeting a minivan in Gaza killed five senior Hamas militants.

Hours later, Hamas hit southern Israel with more than 40 rockets, one of which struck a parking lot near Sapir College, killing a 47-year-old student there.

Israel retaliated with more airstrikes in Gaza on Wednesday, killing 11 people -- most of them militants, but also three children, including a 6-month-old baby.

Palestinian militants in Gaza fired at least 20 Qassam rockets and 10 mortars into Israel on Thursday, according to the Israeli military. Two rockets struck the Israeli city of Ashkelon -- about 7 miles (11 kilometers) north of Gaza.

Another salvo of rockets struck in the city of Sderot shortly before Israeli President Shimon Peres made a brief visit to Sapir College.

Earlier, Israeli Public Security Minister Avi Dichter visited the site but was forced to huddle in a bomb shelter with a CNN crew when sirens indicated incoming rocket fire.

More red alert sirens sounded Thursday afternoon, and an Israeli security official ordered everyone at the site -- including CNN's Ben Wedeman -- to head for cover. Watch as Wedeman reports from Sderot as a rocket warning goes off »

A short time later, a couple of rockets struck to the north, and Wedeman reported seeing a "slight puff of smoke over the horizon."

"There's really at the end of the day nothing security can do to protect somebody," Wedeman said. "People have to run to the bomb shelters; in the absence of that, there's nothing you can do to stop an incoming rocket."

The short-range homemade Qassam missiles are fired from Gaza into Sderot and surrounding communities on almost a daily basis.

Sderot is a frequent target because it's near Gaza -- about 1.5 miles (2.5 kilometers) away. Increased Israeli security has forced militants to fire Qassams from deeper inside Gaza, but the range and accuracy of the unguided rockets have improved in recent months.

The Israeli Defense Ministry said Barak spoke Thursday with Egyptian intelligence chief Omar Sulayman and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, a special envoy for the Middle East "Quartet" -- the European Union, United Nations, United States and Russia -- which is attempting to negotiate Mideast peace.

"The message Barak conveyed to them was that Israel cannot accept this situation," the ministry statement said. "Israel must respond. The responsibility for the deterioration is on Hamas and it will also bear the consequences."

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said she discussed the situation with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in a meeting Thursday in Japan.

Rice said she voiced her condolences for the Israeli student's death and "reiterated our concerns for the humanitarian circumstances" in Gaza.

"I'm concerned about the humanitarian condition there and innocent people in the Gaza who are being hurt," she said.

"We have to remember that the Hamas activities there are responsible for what has happened in Gaza, the illegal coup that they led against the Palestinian Authority institutions, the legitimate institutions of the Palestinian Authority. And so it's very clear where this started," Rice said, referring to Hamas seizing full control of Gaza last year after clashes with rival Palestinian faction Fatah.

Olmert has vowed not to "slacken" against the ongoing rocket attacks on Israel, which he described as an "almost daily war."

"We will continue to struggle in order to reduce to nil the threat that is upsetting the quality of life of residents of the south," he said earlier this month.

As part of that struggle, Olmert said, Israel will continue its military operations and its blockade of "materials that could serve the terrorist organizations, including energy."

Tensions have run high in Gaza since Israel reinforced troops around the region. The Israelis are looking to avoid a repeat of what happened on Gaza's border with Egypt last month, when hundreds of thousands of people flooded out after militants blasted the border wall. Israeli officials have said they will defend the border vigilantly.

Border access between Gaza and neighboring Israel and Egypt has been greatly restricted since June 2007, when Hamas took over the territory.

Human rights groups have protested against the blockade of electricity and fuel shipments into Gaza, blaming Israel for punishing civilians along with the territory's Hamas leadership.

"This may not always be loved, but it is an important part of counterterrorist activity," Olmert said. E-mail to a friend

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