GAZA: Israeli forces shelled areas deep inside Gaza City on Thursday, hitting the headquarters of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency and wounding at least three people among the hundreds taking shelter in the compound, UN officials and witnesses said.
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel expressed regret for the strike but said that Israeli forces were fired on by Hamas militants from just outside the UN compound and that the militants then ran inside to take cover, according to Olmert’s spokesman, Mark Regev.
The UN secretary general, Ban Ki …

AMMAN (Reuters) – U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon expressed alarm on Wednesday over reports of Lebanese rocket attacks against Israel and urged all parties in the region to avoid actions that could make a bad situation worse.
“That is … a very alarming, very disturbing and troubling situation,” Ban told reporters in the Jordanian capital on the first day of a week-long tour of the Middle East.
Ban said that U.N. peacekeepers in Lebanon, known as UNIFIL, were investigating the rocket attacks launched from inside Lebanon. The incident took place on the 19th …

Hamas officials say they have given Egyptian mediators their views on a Gaza cease-fire plan with Israel, and are waiting for Israel’s response.
Palestinian medics Wednesday said more than 1,000 people in Gaza have been killed in the 19-day conflict.
The head of the U.N.’s children’s agency, UNICEF, says 300 children are among the dead.
Thirteen Israelis have died in the conflict, which Israel launched to stop Hamas rocket attacks on southern Israel.

Palestinian medical sources said Wednesday that the death toll in the Gaza conflict has risen to 1,010 Palestinians. Another 4,700 have been wounded in the conflict, which began on December 27, the medics said.
Thirteen Israelis, including 10 soldiers, have died in the operation in Gaza and from rocket strikes on southern Israel, according to the Israeli military. More than 100 soldiers have been wounded, most of them not seriously.
As Israeli warplanes and artillery pounded Gaza for a 19th day, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon once again called for an immediate halt …

Rockets fired from Lebanon struck Israel on Wednesday for the second time in a week while its Gaza offensive ground on, but there was no immediate sign the incident would escalate into wider violence.
There was no initial claim of responsibility for the attack, which triggered warning sirens in parts of northern Israel, and police said no one was hurt.
On Thursday, a similar salvo hit northern Israel but Lebanese and Israeli officials were quick to play down that incident, blaming not the Iranian-backed Hezbollah movement, an ally of Gaza’s Hamas, but …

Iran’s top leader has issued a religious opinion, or fatwa, declaring the purchase of any Israeli goods or trade with Israeli companies to be forbidden.
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme political and religious authority, is urging Muslims throughout the world to avoid the purchase of any products that would profit Israelis.
A fatwa is a religious opinion that Muslims only obey if they revere the person issuing it, which in the case of Khamenei would be restricted largely to Iranian Shi’ites.

As Israel takes to the Internet in search of innovative ways to make its case about Gaza to the world, Jews around the globe also are utilizing innovative methods — and particularly new technological tools — to explain what the Jewish state is facing as it acts to protect its southern flank from rocket fire.
StandWithUs, a Los Angeles-based pro-Israel group, has established a round-the-clock Internet task force — in cooperation with the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya, Israel — to monitor Web sites and provide instant responses to attacks on the …

Israeli military officials said their 19-day offensive in the Gaza Strip had weakened Hamas but that a knockout blow was unlikely. The conflict showed no signs of ending Wednesday as diplomats reported little progress in negotiating a truce.
In Cairo, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon met Wednesday with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in a bid to break the diplomatic impasse. Ban said he would keep pushing Israel and Hamas to observe a U.N. Security Council resolution calling for a cease-fire but was not optimistic.

Israeli ground forces fought fierce street battles with Palestinian militants in Gaza City Tuesday, while Israeli warplanes reportedly bombed areas along the Egypt-Gaza border.
Israeli soldiers, backed by helicopter gunships, pushed into Gaza City’s densely-populated Tel al-Hawa neighborhood, but have yet to move on the center of the territory’s largest city.
On the territory’s southern tip, an official with the aid agency CARE International, Jawab Hab, said Israel has launched air strikes on houses in Rafah, 100 meters from the border with Egypt. Israel has said it is targeting tunnels in the …

Israeli planes have carried out fewer air strikes on the Gaza Strip overnight, as some reserve units went into action on the ground.
There were 12 air raids – compared with as many as 60 on previous nights. At least nine rockets or mortars were fired on Israel from Gaza on Monday.
The Israeli military denied stepping up a ground offensive against Hamas, despite renewed fierce fighting.
Earlier, PM Ehud Olmert said Israel was nearing its military goals.