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Israel intensifies campaign by calling up 33,000 reserves

JERUSALEM — As world leaders tried to steer Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu away from sending ground forces into the Gaza Strip, Israel intensified its military campaign against Hamas by calling up 33,000 reserve soldiers and, possibly, bolstering infantry brigades.

Israeli firefighters extinguishing a fire that broke out after a rocket hit a petrol station in Ashdod yesterday. PHOTO: REUTERS

Israeli firefighters extinguishing a fire that broke out after a rocket hit a petrol station in Ashdod yesterday. PHOTO: REUTERS

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JERUSALEM — As world leaders tried to steer Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu away from sending ground forces into the Gaza Strip, Israel intensified its military campaign against Hamas by calling up 33,000 reserve soldiers and, possibly, bolstering infantry brigades.

Yesterday, a fourth day of Israeli air strikes on the Gaza Strip killed 11 more Palestinians, raising the death toll in the coastal enclave to at least 96, most of them civilians, said Palestinian officials.

Facing a possible Israeli ground invasion, the armed wing of Hamas militants warned international airlines they would fire rockets at Tel Aviv’s main airport. A rocket also caused the first serious Israeli casualty — one of eight people was hurt when a fuel tanker was hit at a service station in Ashdod, 30km north of Gaza.

Israel said it was determined to end cross-border rocket attacks that intensified last month after its forces arrested hundreds of activists from the Islamist Hamas movement in the occupied West Bank following the abduction of three Jewish teenagers who were later found killed. A Palestinian youth was killed in Jerusalem in a suspected Israeli revenge attack.

Israel’s military commander, Lieutenant-General Benny Gantz, said his forces were ready to act as needed — an indication of a readiness to send in tanks and other ground troops, as Israel last did for two weeks in early 2009. “We are in the midst of an assault and we are prepared to expand it as much as is required, to wherever is required, with whatever force will be required and for as long as will be required,” Lt-Gen Gantz said.

Israel already has deployed three infantry brigades near the Gaza Strip border, army spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Peter Lerner said in a phone briefing. About 194 rockets have been launched at Israel in the past 24 hours, he said, adding that the Iron Dome defence system has a 90 per cent success rate in intercepting rocket fire.

World leaders have sought to steer Israel from sending ground forces into Gaza. United States President Barack Obama spoke by phone with Mr Netanyahu on Thursday and offered to “facilitate a cessation of hostilities”, said a White House statement. United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told the Security Council that the threat of a ground offensive is “still palpable, and preventable, only if Hamas stops rocket firing”.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas told Hamas to stop its attacks to end the bloodshed in a rare public rebuke that may further strain their political alliance.

Western-backed Mr Abbas, who is based in the West Bank and agreed a power-sharing deal with Gaza’s dominant Hamas in April after years of feuding, called for international help. “The Palestinian leadership urges the Security Council to quickly issue a clear condemnation of this Israeli aggression and impose a commitment of a mutual ceasefire immediately,” he said.

Israel aircraft stepped up weeks of strikes on Gaza on July 8 after rocket fire grew heavier, reaching farther into Israel than before. Israel has struck about 1,100 targets in Gaza, including tunnels militants dug under the border with Israel, said the army.

The offensive is the deadliest since November 2012, when around 180 Palestinians and six Israelis were killed during an Israeli air campaign to punish Hamas for missile attacks. That conflict was eventually halted with mediation from Egypt, which was then governed by Hamas’ Muslim Brotherhood allies. AGENCIES

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