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Rocket attacks continue despite ceasefire

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Palestinian militants overnight continued to fire rockets and mortar shells at Israeli towns despite a ceasefire that was announced two days ago. Three Grad rockets were fired toward Be’er Sheva and Ofakim in southern Israel. This morning, after the Israel Air Force launched several strikes on the Gaza Strip overnight in response, Palestinian militants fired a rocket into southern Israel.

The Iron Dome anti-missile battery shot down two of the Grads fired Wednesday night, while the third landed on open areas. After the rockets landed shortly before 07:00 pm local time, five southern cities – Be’er Sheva, Ashdod, Ashkelon, Kiryat Malakhi and Gan Yavneh – announced schools would remain closed today.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was supposed to leave for Paris and Madrid yesterday, but cancelled the trip due to the “security situation in southern Israel”. The trip was scheduled to discuss Iran’s nuclear programme with French President Nicolas Sarkozy and the new Spanish prime minister, Mariano Rajoy.

As of last night, no Palestinian organisation has claimed responsibility for the rockets. The IDF assess that they were launched by one of the small, radical Islamist factions in Gaza.

Israeli Defence officials have said they believe Hamas does not want a resumption of violence right now and will, therefore, try and restrain smaller factions. Nevertheless, they have stressed that Israel will continue to target terrorists if intelligence warnings indicate a planned attack.