Israel Continues Defending Itself While Palis Feud

Updated with fresh car swarm photos and caption (Hat tip: Alouette).

Palestinians inspect the wreckage of a car driven by Hamas militants after it was hit in an Israeli missile strike in Gaza City, Friday, May 25, 2007. Israeli missile strikes hit a succession of militant targets in the Gaza Strip on Friday, killing two, while Hamas fired rockets toward Israel as Palestinian factions met to discuss a possible truce. (AP Photo/Adel Hana)

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GAZA (Reuters) - Israeli missiles pounded the Gaza Strip on Friday, one of which hit near the home of Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, as Palestinian factions argued among themselves over whether to stop firing rockets into Israel.

President Mahmoud Abbas of the secular Fatah group was due to meet officials from Haniyeh's Hamas Islamist movement later to hear its formal response to Abbas's call for an end to Hamas rocket attacks as a prelude to a wider ceasefire with Israel.

But though street fighting between Fatah and Hamas has died down since a flare-up two weeks ago that killed some 50 people, tension remains high between the partners in the two-month-old Palestinian unity government and Hamas officials have already dismissed Abbas's call and vowed to continue firing rockets.

Abbas called the rocket attacks "pointless" and "needless."

After a barrage of seven Israeli air strikes overnight against positions in Gaza used by Hamas and another group, Islamic Jihad, a senior Hamas figure again condemned Abbas's call for conciliatory moves toward Israel and several more improvised rockets struck Israel from the coastal enclave:

"Abbas hates rockets just like we hate the Jews," Nizar Rayyan told reporters during a Hamas rally in the Gaza Strip.

More recently this evening, the Israelis took out another mobile weapons lab.

GAZA, May 25 (Reuters) - Israel's air force bombed a van in the Gaza Strip on Friday, killing at least two people, Palestinian witnesses and medics said.

The Israeli military had no immediate comment on the air strike in Gaza City's Sejaiya neighbourhood, an Islamist stronghold.

No car swarm photos available yet.