Foreign Affairs Minister Tzipi Livni addressed the launching of a Qassam rocket from Gaza towards Sderot on Thursday with sharp, stinging rhetoric aimed at differentiating herself from Prime Minister Ehud Olmert
| Crossings Closed |
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| Gaza crossings to remain closed due to rocket attack / Hanan Greenberg |
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(Video) Defense minister decides not to allow transfer of goods into Strip on Wednesday. Southern residents not surprised by three Qassams which hit western Negev on Tuesday afternoon. 'I knew truce wouldn’t last more than a week,' says kibbutz resident |
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and Defense Minister Ehud Barak.
"I don't care who fired. There must be an immediate military response to every violation," said Livni upon the commencement of her meeting with Norwegian Jonas Gahr Støre.
"I have made my position clear to both the prime minister and the minister of defense after the first infringement. And I intend to make this clear to my foreign counterparts as well," said Livni.
The al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, Fatah’s military wing, took responsibility for firing a Qassam rocket from Gaza into Israel on Thursday afternoon. The rocket landed in Sderot's industrial zone, causing no injuries or damage.
Palestinian sources believe that the firing was meant to embarrass Hamas and to harm the ceasefire
efforts.
On Tuesday, Palestinians launched three rockets towards Sderot. One of the Qassams landed in a house's backyard, causing great damage. Two women were treated for shock.
The Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for Tuesday's attack. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert responded to the barrage angrily, saying "this is a blatant and unequivocal violation of the understandings reached as
part of the truce."
Despite Thursday's attack, Palestinian authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad called on Israel to reopen Gaza's border crossings, which were shut following Tuesday's rocket attacks. "We have 1.5 million of our people with a sense of not having much to lose. That situation must end," Fayyad told a news conference in Prague with Czech Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek.
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