Israel responds to bombing with air attack

GAZA, Jan. 27 (UPI) -- An Israeli military aircraft struck smugglers' tunnels in Gaza early Wednesday after militants set off a deadly bomb on the Israeli border, Palestinians said.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert warned of a "further response" to the militants' bombing, allegedly carried out by a Hamas breakaway group identified with the al-Qaida-affiliated Global Jihad, Haaretz reported.

"What the (Israeli military) did today was not a response but a preliminary action," he said.

The violence along the border between Israel and Gaza left one Israeli soldier and three more wounded Tuesday. A Palestinian farmer also was killed, officials said.

An Israeli military official said the remote-detonated bomb appeared to have been planted along the border by someone who slipped across in the fog, The New York Times reported. Palestinian witnesses said the farmer was killed a short time later, the newspaper said.

The Israeli military subsequently closed the border crossings and troops made a brief incursion into Gaza.

"This is a harsh attack and we cannot accept it," Defense Minister Ehud Barak said. "And we will respond."

Palestinian officials said Israel also shelled a house in the village of Khan Yunis, injuring two children.

Israel's initial military campaign, aimed at stopping Hamas from firing rockets into Israel from Gaza, ended Jan. 18 after Israel and Hamas -- which controls Gaza -- proclaimed separate cease-fires. Israeli troops subsequently withdrew to the perimeters of the strip.

U.S. President Barack Obama Monday dispatched George Mitchell, special envoy to the Middle East, on an eight-day trip to Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, France and Britain.

Hamas officials told Haaretz the Israeli aircraft struck three times, sending Rafah residents fleeing from their homes.

Earlier, an Israeli military aircraft fired a missile at a militant on a motorbike in the Khan Yunis area of Gaza, Haaretz said. The Shin Bet security service said the militant, identified as Hussein Abu-Shamaya, was involved in the bombing.