Barak Warns Hamas over Rockets, Syria over Cross-Border Fire

Israel warned the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas on Sunday it will pay a "heavy price" for the latest barrage of rocket attacks into the Jewish state and that the conflict could escalate.

"Hamas is responsible for the rocket fire and all other attempts to harm our soldiers and civilians, even when other groups participate. And it is Hamas that will pay the heavy price," Defense Minister Ehud Barak said.

The flare-up, which began Saturday, as well as tough statements from Israeli officials, raised the specter of a broader Israeli operation against Gaza, along the lines of its devastating Operation Cast Lead over the New Year of 2009.

"During the last two days, the IDF (Israel Defense Force), upon my instruction, has been evaluating the host of options for harsher responses against Hamas and the other terror organizations in Gaza," Barak said.

"We will strike with an ever-growing intensity," he added.

In December 2008, just six weeks before general elections, Israel launched a huge operation in Gaza against rocket fire. The 22-day war killed 1,400 Palestinians -- half of them civilians -- and 13 Israelis, 10 of them soldiers.

The latest violence comes ahead of Israeli elections in January.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned earlier that Israel is "prepared to escalate" its response to Palestinian rocket fire.

"The army is acting and will act forcefully against the terror organizations in the Gaza Strip. They are receiving strong blows from the army," Netanyahu told a meeting of his cabinet.

"The world must realize that Israel won't sit by idly in the face of attempts to attack us. We are prepared to escalate our actions," he said.

The flare-up erupted on Saturday evening when Gaza militants fired an anti-tank missile at an Israeli jeep along the Gaza border, injuring four soldiers, one of them severely. Three remained in hospital on Sunday.

Israel retaliated with air strikes, shelling and artillery fire that killed six Palestinians and wounded 35 by Sunday night.

Palestinian militants fired at least 85 rockets into southern Israel, leaving four injured in the Israeli border town of Sderot. Two rockets were intercepted by Israel's missile defense system Iron Dome.

"It's a very severe situation, rockets are landing on our towns and villages, almost on a daily basis and of course no democratic country can tolerate such a thing," said Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz, a Netanyahu confidant.

U.S. ambassador Dan Shapiro, writing on Facebook, said American "thoughts are with the residents of southern Israel, who continue to be bombarded with missile attacks from terrorist organizations in Gaza."

"The United States supports Israel's right to defend itself and its citizens from these attacks," he said.

On Sunday, Palestinian medics said the death toll stood at six, after an Islamic Jihad militant named as Mohammed Shwikani, 20, was killed in an air strike near the northern Gaza town of Jabaliya.

Medics also reported finding the body of a second Jihad member, Mohammed Abed, 20, who was killed in another air raid east of Jabaliya.

The Israeli military said it had attacked seven targets on Saturday night, including arms dumps, a weapons-making facility and two rocket-launching sites "in response to recent events."

Medics said 35 people were wounded, with Ashraf al-Qudra, spokesman for the Hamas-run health ministry, adding that 10 had undergone amputations.

He named the four civilians killed as 20-year-old Matar Abul Ata, 17-year-old Mohammed Harara, 15-year-old Ahmed Harara and 18-year-old Ahmed Dardasawy.

The violence prompted authorities on both sides of the border to close some schools, and in Gaza the Hamas government and militant groups vowed revenge.

"The occupation attacked Palestinian civilians east of Gaza City and Khan Younis. We consider this escalation as very dangerous. It must stop immediately," said Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhum.

The radical Popular Resistance Committees vowed "the Zionist enemy will pay a high price for this crime against Gaza." And Islamic Jihad warned that "every aggression against the Palestinian people will be followed by a response."

Tensions have been rising on the border since Thursday, when an Israeli soldier was wounded after explosives packed into a border tunnel were detonated in an attack claimed by Hamas' armed wing.

Hours earlier, a 13-year-old Palestinian was shot dead by gunfire from an Israeli helicopter in the same area.

Separately, Barak said Israel will take "tougher" action in response to any new fire from Syria into the Jewish state, after Israeli troops fired warning shots into its Arab neighbor.

"Syria has been in the midst of a brutal civil war for over a year, and the IDF (military) has been instructed to prevent the battles from spilling over... Additional shelling into Israel from Syria will elicit a tougher response, exacting a higher price from Syria," Barak said in a statement.

The Israeli army on Sunday said a mortar round fired from the Syrian side had hit one of its positions on the Golan plateau, prompting the riposte from its troops.

"A mortar shell hit an IDF (Israel Defense Forces) post in the Golan Heights... as part of the internal conflict inside Syria," it said, adding that "in response, IDF soldiers fired warning shots towards Syrian areas."

Military sources told Agence France Presse the army fired a single Tamuz anti-tank missile, a weapon known for being highly accurate, towards the Syrian outpost from which the mortar round was fired.

"We shot toward them, but deliberately missed," one said.

Chief military spokesman Yoav Mordechai said it was Israel's first firing across the armistice line since the 1973 Middle East war.