Airstrikes persist despite Gaza truce

JERUSALEM -- Israeli aircraft and Gaza rocket squads traded strikes across the border yesterday as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu blamed Iran for the violence from the Palestinian territory.

Netanyahu, going a step further in his warnings to Iran, hinted that Israel didn't need Washington's blessing to go ahead and attack Iran's suspect nuclear program.

Yesterday's cross-border violence tested a shaky truce Israel and Gaza militants reached this week to halt a four-day flare-up in fighting. Since then, sporadic rocket fire and Israeli airstrikes have persisted.

Israeli aircraft struck two militant sites in Gaza before dawn in response to rocket fire a day earlier. Gaza gunmen retaliated by launching two rockets at Israel by midday, police said. No injuries were reported.

Netanyahu, in a speech to parliament on Wednesday, accused Iran of arming, financing and training Gaza militants, and giving them their marching orders. "Gaza is Iran," he declared.

Israel considers Iran to be its most fearsome enemy, in large part because it is convinced Tehran is developing atomic weapons technology, despite its claims its nuclear program is peaceful.

Also yesterday, an Israeli soldier was stabbed on Jerusalem's light rail, and police apprehended a Palestinian suspect at a Jerusalem crossing into the West Bank, police said. A hospital official said the soldier was in serious condition with stab wounds near her heart.

-- AP