Israeli launches air stike on Hamas-held Gaza

Gaza: Israel on Wednesday launched its first major attacks in the Gaza Strip since Hamas took over the territory, killing at least four Palestinian fighters.

Israel carried out air strikes against rocket launch sites in northern Gaza after militants fired at least one makeshift rocket into southern Israel.

Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for firing the rocket.

Earlier on Wednesday, Israeli troops killed four Palestinian fighters in the first such deadly skirmish in the coastal enclave since Hamas Islamist militias overran President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah faction and seized control of the territory a week ago.

Officials said two Hamas fighters and two other militants were killed in the clash near the Kissufim border crossing. Israeli tanks and troops had pushed into the coastal enclave in a hunt for wanted Palestinian militants, the army said.

Two other Palestinian guerrillas, one from Islamic Jihad and another from Fatah were killed in a gun battle at Jenin in the West Bank, the larger of the two Palestinian territories. Fatah remains dominant there.Israeli troops killed six Palestinians on Wednesday, including four in the first deadly clash in the Gaza Strip since Hamas Islamists took control of the territory by force last week.

Several Israeli tanks and troops crossed the border fence into Gaza overnight near the key Kissufim border crossing in the central Gaza Strip, witnesses said.

An army spokesman said the force was searching for wanted militants.

Two Hamas militants, a member of another militant group, the Popular Resistance Committees, and an unidentified gunman were killed in the Gaza gun battle.

One Israeli soldier was moderately injured in the Gaza clash, an Israeli army spokesman said.