Two children killed in Israeli air strike on Gaza

GAZA, June 20 (Reuters) An Israeli air strike targeting a car carrying Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip today killed two child bystanders and wounded eight children and two adults, witnesses and medics said.

They said the dead were a 5-year-old boy and a girl under the age of 7.

The militants, members of a group under Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah faction, jumped clear of the vehicle before it was struck in Gaza City.

An Israeli military spokeswoman confirmed the strike, saying the targets were from Fatah's al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades and had recently mounted attacks against the Jewish state.

Gaza, which Israel quit last year after 38 years of occupation, has seen a flare-up in violence.

Israel has answered cross-border rocket salvoes with air strikes and artillery barrages. The Israeli shelling has caused several civilian casualties, drawing international condemnation.

In the Israeli border town of Sderot, which has borne the brunt of Palestinian rocket attacks, residents have staged protests and urged the government for tougher actions in Gaza.

Israeli Defence Minister Amir Peretz, who lives in Sderot, on Monday pledged new military counter-measures ''within a matter of dozens of hours'' but did not elaborate.

Israel Radio, quoting witnesses, said Israeli armoured units were massing outside northern Gaza. Israel has limited its ground operations over the past year to quick forays by small infantry units.

Reuters MP DB2334