Israeli DM vows tough response to Palestinian rocket attacks

Israeli Defense Minister Amir Peretz vowed a "tough and painful" response on Tuesday to continuous Palestinian militant rocket attacks.

"If the rocket attacks don't stop, Israel's response will be tough and painful," Peretz was quoted by local newspaper the Jerusalem Post as saying.

Peretz made the vow shortly after two rockets fired by Palestinian militants from the northern Gaza Strip hit the southern Israeli city of Sderot on Tuesday morning.

One Israeli woman was lightly wounded by rocket shrapnel and several other people were suffering from shock and a building was directly hit by one of the rockets and severely damaged, according to the report.

In response, the Israeli army shelled the suspected rocket launching sites in the Gaza Strip.

Recently, Sderot has been a frequent target of rocket attacks launched by Palestinian militants in Gaza.

On Monday, two rockets hit Sderot and two others landed outside the town, causing neither injury nor damage.

Last week, one of four rockets fired from the northern Gaza Strip hit and badly damaged a residential building not far away from Israeli Defense Minister Peretz's house in Sderot.

Roughly three weeks ago, a rocket scored a direct hit on a classroom in a Sderot high school, but nobody was hurt in the attack.

With recent frequent rocket attacks by Palestinian militants from Gaza, some senior Israeli officials and army officers have called for reentering the Gaza Strip and launching ground operations to prevent more rocket attacks.

But Peretz, from the dovish Labor party, has expressed his opposition to the reoccupation of Gaza, saying that was not a relevant tactic but adding that Israel would continue raids including ground operations in a bid to stem out the rocket attacks.

Israel withdrew from the entire Gaza Strip last summer.

Source: Xinhua