Israel launches airstrike at workshop in Gaza

Israeli aircraft fired missiles at a metal workshop in Gaza City early Tuesday, causing some damage to the building but no injuries, Palestinian officials said.

Photo: Israel launches airstrike at workshop in Gaza

The Israeli army said the strike targeted a building used by the radical Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine for constructing homemade rockets to fire at Israel.

The airstrike came after an Islamic Jihad suicide bomber killed nine civilians in an attack on a Tel Aviv restaurant Monday afternoon, reports AP.

According to Ha'aretz, Israel, Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz and the heads of the defense establishment decided Monday evening on a series of Israeli responses to the suicide bombing in Tel Aviv earlier in the day, in which nine people were killed and dozens wounded.

Some of the actions agreed upon are still to be approved by Interim Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

The central recommendation put forward during the debate was to step up the policy of "separation" in the West Bank, which aims to effectively end any travel between Palestinian cities, mainly in the area of Jenin and Tul Karm and the areas around Ramallah and Nablus.

The defense establishment also recommended continuing the policy of assassinating Islamic Jihad leaders in the Gaza Strip and the expansion of actions aimed at curbing Qassam rocket fire from Gaza.

The Israel Defense Forces will also expand its ongoing search and arrest operation in the Jenin and Tul Karm area, which targets members of Islamic Jihad, and a similar operation in Nablus, which concentrates on members of Islamic Jihad, Fatah and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.

O.Ch.