JERUSALEM, Feb. 18 (Xinhua) -- Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman on Sunday accused the Popular Resistance Committees, an armed group in Gaza, for perpetrating an explosion that wounded four soldiers near Gaza.
No organization had claimed responsibility for the incident, in which an explosive device attached to the fence between Israel and the besieged Palestinian enclaved detonated on Saturday afternoon.
Speaking with the Hebrew-language Ynet news site on Sunday, Lieberman said the Popular Resistance Committees, a small Gazan militant organization, was in behind the incident.
He vowed to hunt the perpetrators. "We will assassinate those who carried out the attack," the minister said.
In response to the incident, the Israeli air force launched a large-scale attack, striking 18 targets in Gaza on Saturday evening and before dawn on Sunday, according to a military statement. The strikes targeted sites belonging to Hamas, the Islamist organization that runs Gaza, the military said.
Palestinian medical sources said that at least two Palestinian youths were killed in the strikes, according to a report by the official Palestinian news agency of WAFA.
The sporadic gunfire or rocket attacks from Gaza over the past years were mostly perpetrated by opposition organizations. However, the Israeli military maintains that Hamas should be hold accountable for any hostility that comes from the strip.
