Tension is rising across the Middle East as Israel and Hamas, the Palestinian group which controls the Gaza Strip, continue to exchange fire amid theworst outbreak of violence since the Israeli assault on the territory nearly four years ago.
Three Israelis died in the northern town of Kiryat Malachi on Thursday after a rocket fired from Gaza hit an apartment building.
Separately, Islamic Jihad, another Gaza-based Palestinian group, said that it had fired a rocket that reportedly hit Israel's commercial centre Tel Aviv. Israeli security sources confirmed that a rocket fired at Tel Aviv landed in the sea.
World reacts to renewed Israel-Gaza conflict
While southern Israeli areas near Gaza have long coped with rocket fire, the attacks on the Tel Avivarea illustrated the significant capabilities that Hamas has developed.
At least 15 Palestinians, including two children, have been killed and nearly 200 more wounded as of Thursday in fighting which began with an aerial attack that killed Ahmad Jabari , Hamas military commander who was accused by Israel for overseeing attacks against civilians.
"It is important to understand one simple point: there is no moral symmetry between the terrorists in Gaza and Israel," Binyamin Netanyahu, Israeli prime minister, said on Thursday
"They are committing double war crimes: they fire at Israeli civilians and hide behind Palestinian civilians."
Netanyahu referred to the Israeli attacks on Gaza as "surgical".
On the second day of an assault Israel said might last many days and culminate in a ground attack, its fighter jets bombed targets in and around Gaza City, where tall buildings trembled.
Israeli authorities said more than 250 rockets andmortars were fired by Hamas and other armed groups from Gaza as of Thursday afternoon, and that its Iron Dome interceptor missile system had shot down dozens of the projectiles.
On either side of the frontier, people fled streets for cover.
Tel Aviv targeted
Israeli Channel 2 TV showed panicked Tel Aviv residents running for cover and lying down on theground after the air-raid sirens began sounding.
The Israeli military said two rockets had been fired at the city, and residents heard an explosion.
The armed wing of the Islamic Jihad said on Thursday it had fired an Iranian-built rocket at the Israeli city of Tel Aviv.
Spokesman Mark Regev defends Israeli attacks
"The Quds Brigades hit the occupied city of Tel Rabea [Tel Aviv] with a Fajr 5 rocket causing a large explosion to shake the city," the group said in a brief statement, shortly after an AFP correspondent reported seeing a rocket land in the water south of the sprawling coastal city.
"What comes next will be greater."
In a separate statement, posted on the group's website, Abu Ahmed, Islamic Jihad spokesperson,pledged that Israel would experience "further surprises so long as the aggression against the Palestinian people continues.
"The enemy began the battle but the resistance will determine how the battle will end," he said.
Palestinian fighters had previously hit Rishon Lezion before but never reached Tel Aviv, roughly70km north of the Gaza Sttrip.
The sudden conflict pours oil on the fire of a Middle East already tense with two years of revolution and an out-of-control civil war in Syria.
Egypt recalled its ambassador to Israel on Wednesday, summoned the Israeli ambassador to Cairo in protest over the assault and ordered itsrepresentative at the UN to call for an emergency Security Council meeting.
Egyptian decision
Mohamed Morsi, the Egypttian president, spoke to US President Barack Obama and Ban Ki-moon, UN secretary-general, over phone and discussed the Gaza escalation with them.
Taher Nuno, Hamas government spokesperson, said that Egypt would send a delegation headed by Hesham Kandil, Egyptian prime minister, to Gaza on Friday.
Thursday's deadly rocket fire on Kiryat Malahi was claimed by Jabari's group, the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, in a statement on its website.
Jabari's funeral took place in Gaza on Thursday.
Israel warned Hamas that all its men were in its sights and faced censure from influential Arab countries - with the Arab League announcing it was to hold an emergency meeting on Saturday and Egypt recalling its ambassador to Israel.
Mark Regev, spokesperson for Netanyahu's office,told Al Jazeera that Israel will "continue to hit theHamas military machine, to hit their command and control, to hit their arsenal where they store their weapons.
"Unfortunately today the Israeli population of southern Israel is on the receiving end of these barrages. We have had three people killed. Children, instead of going to school, are stuck in bomb shelters.
"We will They must understand that they cannot hit Israeli civilians with impunity."
The US condemned Hamas, long shunned by the West as an obstacle to peace.
Describing Wednesday's violence, Al Jazeera's Nadim Baba, reporting from Gaza, said: "In the last 30 seconds there was another big blast. [The strikes] have been going on all evening.
"It is not just air strikes, but also strikes from Israeli naval ships just off the coast of Gaza."
He said the streets of Gaza City on Wednesday evening were "eerily quiet, except for the sound of ambulances".
"The latest from medical sources is that at least seven people have been ........

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Biafrans, where you all at?? Its time for you to go defend the land of Israel....time for you to carry arms in the name of zion, your ancestry, and show your warrior skills. . yeye fools

Negro_Ntns: Biafrans, where you all at?? Its time for you to go defend the land of Israel....time for you to carry arms in the name of zion, your ancestry, and show your warrior skills. . yeye fools

When are you going to stop being the resident Nairaland FOOL- In- Chief?
Your inferiority complex is getting the better part of you. SMH.

I advise isreali‘s to start firing civilians and children so that dem go see how em dey be 4 bodi, after all they are d future millitants. F00ls

Funny thing is, the fight they fought in the time of David still continues till today. Hamas should take a lesson from Hezbollah on how to deal with Isreal.

dont8: Funny thing is, the fight they fought in the time of David still continues till today. Hamas should take a lesson from Hezbollah on how to deal with Isreal.

The victory of Hezbollah over Israel is still being debated.