Hamas vows revenge after airstrike kills 7 militants

The Islamic militant group Hamas that rules Gaza vowed revenge on Israel for the deaths of seven of its members killed in an airstrike early on Monday morning in the deadliest exchange of fire since the latest round of attacks began weeks ago.

Hamas' said "the enemy will pay a tremendous price".

The group said its men were killed by an Israeli airstrike on a tunnel used by the militants.

Two militants from a different group were also killed in a separate strike. The men were involved in rocket attacks on southern Israeli communities, the Israeli military said.

Israel said it carried out airstrikes on at least "14 terror sites", including "concealed rocket launchers" in Gaza, overnight in retaliation for a recent spike in attacks from that area. About a dozen rockets were fired at Israel from Gaza overnight, the military said. One injured a soldier.

Gaza militants fired an additional 25 rockets at Israel on Sunday, the military said.

The military said Palestinian militants have fired more than 200 rockets at southern Israel in recent weeks, and it has responded with scores of airstrikes in Gaza.

Peter Lerner, a military spokesman, said the rocket attacks are "unbearable and unacceptable".

"We will continue to act in order to debilitate and incapacitate the Hamas terror infrastructure by striking its warehouses, rocket manufacturing capabilities and those that endanger the well-being of the Israelis in the south of the country," he said.

Gaza militants have been bombarding Israel with daily rocket fire for weeks, drawing Israeli airstrikes in retaliation. The nine militants killed overnight on Monday made it the deadliest day of fighting so far.

An Israeli army patrol was attacked on Monday morning along the Gaza border fence, the military said. No one was injured in the attack, which it said may have included a rocket-propelled grenade.

Tensions have soared in Israel and Palestinian territories since three Israeli teens - one of them a US citizen - were kidnapped while hitchhiking in the West Bank last month.

Last week, the teens' bodies were found in a West Bank field in a gruesome crime Israel blamed on Hamas. Hamas, which has kidnapped Israelis before, praised the kidnappings and deaths of the teenagers but did not take responsibility for them.

Just hours after the youths were buried, Mohammed Abu Khdeir, a 16-year-old Palestinian-American from east Jerusalem, was abducted near his home. His charred remains were found shortly afterward in a Jerusalem forest. Preliminary autopsy results found he had been burned to death.

Israel arrested six Israeli suspects on Sunday, and on Monday three of them confessed to the crime, as the country's leaders raced to contain a public uproar over the slaying.

(China Daily 07/08/2014 page12)