Israel has launched several air raids against targets in southern Gaza near the border with Egypt, causing damages but no injuries, Palestinian security sources have said.
The strikes targeted “open areas” near the town of Rafah and tunnels along the border with Egypt, residents said.
An Israeli military spokesman confirmed that the “Israeli air force intervened in the Gaza Strip,” late on Friday.
“Our planes attacked four tunnels that were dug under the border with Egypt and used for weapons smuggling,” the spokesman told AFP news agency.

The Sri Lankan army says it has captured the last major naval base of Tamil Tiger rebels in the north-east of the island.
It says that about 15 rebel fighters – including three senior commanders – were killed in the fighting at Chalai. There has been no independent confirmation of the report, and no comment from the rebels. Earlier, the government said there would be no ceasefire with the rebels, despite international calls for talks.
Military spokesman Brig Udaya Nanayakkara said that with the capture of Chalai, the army had now brought …

Patients are fleeing a hospital that was hit four times by artillery shells in the war between Tamil Tigers and government forces in northern Sri Lanka this week, the Red Cross said Tuesday.
The development came as independent observers handed The Associated Press dramatic pictures and video, showing scores of civilians killed or maimed. The images offered a rare glimpse of the growing toll the civil war is taking on the estimated 250,000 civilians trapped in the all-but-sealed conflict zone.

As the Sri Lankan military continued to push into a small corner of the island controlled by separatist guerrillas, three separate artillery attacks on Sunday struck a hospital overflowing with wounded patients, the last of them hitting a ward of women and children, according to international agencies and health workers. At least nine people were killed and 20 were wounded and the dead were still being counted Monday morning.

Mounting violence between rebel fighters and government troops along northern Sri Lanka has prompted U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to call for the safety of civilians as humanitarian groups try to provide aid to some 250,000 people trapped in the region.
“The secretary-general is deeply concerned about the safety and well-being of civilians caught in intensified fighting in the Vanni region of Sri Lanka,” a spokesman for Ban said in a statement Monday.

The Congolese government is broadcasting messages to Rwandan rebels within its borders demanding they surrender, the Democratic Republic of Congo’s communications minister told CNN on Sunday.
“We would … prefer a voluntary disarmament,” Mende Omalanga said. “We are campaigning for them to put [down] their guns.”
So far, about 160 of the estimated 6,500 Rwandan rebels in Congo’s eastern regions have heeded the call and laid down their arms, he said.

One of the top Hamas leaders in Gaza has been killed in an air strike, Hamas and Israeli officials have said.
Said Siyam, the Hamas interior minister, was killed in an air raid on his brother’s home near Gaza City.
Earlier, Israeli troops and tanks moved closer into the heart of Gaza City, prompting fierce gun battles with fighters from Hamas.
The UN’s relief agency, Unrwa, said part of its HQ in Gaza caught fire after being hit by Israeli shells.

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 …

The Sri Lankan military says it has taken total control of the northern Jaffna peninsula, one of the Tamil rebels’ last remaining strongholds of power.
The military says it seized control of Chundikkulam village Wednesday after a deadly battle with the rebels.
The rebels have not responded to the announcement, and journalists blocked from the war zone have not independently verified the military’s claim.

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 …