Israel Continues To Launch Airstrikes, Targeting Underground Tunnels And Houses Of Hamas Officials

JAKARTA - Israel bombed an underground tunnel used by Hamas, with Palestinian militants firing rocket attacks on Israeli cities on Monday, local time.

After nighttime airstrikes, the Israeli military said Gaza militants fired about 60 rockets into Israeli cities, down from 120 - 200 rockets two nights earlier.

"A Palestinian sponge factory in northern Gaza was hit by morning airstrikes and firefighters struggled to extinguish the blaze, which sent plumes of smoke into the air. A Palestinian was killed in an airstrike in the early hours of the morning", a Palestinian medical official told Reuters Monday, May 17.

After rockets were fired from Gaza into the Israeli cities of Beersheba and Ashkelon, Israeli jets bombed what the military said was a 15 km (nine-mile) underground tunnel used by Hamas. Israeli military airstrikes this time also targeted a number of homes belonging to Hamas officials.

Gaza health officials say the death toll since hostilities flared in 198, including 58 children and 34 women. Meanwhile, ten people were killed in Israel, including two children, Israeli authorities said.

With the sound of Israeli bombardment continuing throughout the morning, Gazans rushed to bakeries and drugstores to buy bread and other staples.

"My children couldn't sleep all night even after the wave of intensive bombing stopped", said Umm Naeem, 50, a mother of five, as she shopped for bread in Gaza City.

"What happened to us is too much, but Jerusalem deserves all the sacrifices", she continued.