Israeli aircraft send missiles slamming into Haniyeh's office

Israeli aircraft sent missiles slamming into the office of the prime minister of Hamas-ruled Gaza before dawn on Sunday, pressing forward with an offensive that has killed more than 100 Palestinians in five days. The moderate Palestinian president suspended peace talks.

Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh's office was empty at the time of Sunday's airstrike, but the raid was seen as a tough message to the Hamas leadership, which has refused to halt ongoing rocket barrages that target growing swaths of southern Israel.

The bloodshed also threatened to spread to the more peaceful West Bank, where Palestinians took to the streets to protest Israel's Gaza operations. Israeli troops shot and killed a 14-year-old Palestinian boy during one violent demonstration near the town of Hebron, Palestinian medical officials said. The Israeli military said troops opened fire at two armed men.

Fighting raged on in Gaza on Sunday. But the casualty count was far lower than in previous days, possibly because of new security measures imposed by Hamas. The group told its fighters to use alleys for cover and avoid moving in large groups, ordered schools closed and set up roadblocks to keep civilians out of battle zones. In recent days, schoolchildren had left their studies to watch the fighting.

The normally bustling streets of Gaza City were eerily empty. The sound of verses from the Muslim holy book, the Quran, pouring forth from mosque loudspeakers mingled with the roar of Israeli warplanes and unmanned drones in the sky.

Hundreds gathered outside Gaza hospitals waiting for bodies to be brought out of morgues for burial. Many, like schoolteacher Tawfek Shaban, a 44-year-old father of five, were holding small radios, listening to the news.

"Shame on the Arabs, shame on the Muslims, shame on humanity ... When they will act to stop Israel?" Shaban asked. "There is no safe place in Gaza."

A total of 54 Palestinians, roughly half of them civilians, were killed in fighting Saturday, according to Palestinian medical officials, the highest single-day death toll in more than seven years of violence. Two Israeli soldiers also were killed.

The violence caused the moderate Palestinian leadership based in the West Bank to suspend peace talks with Israel and drew condemnations from the international community, including the EU, Saudi Arabia and U.N. chief Ban Ki-Moon, who accused Israel of using "excessive" force.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert rejected the criticism and vowed to press on with the Gaza offensive.

"With all due respect, nothing will prevent us from continuing operations to protect our citizens," he told his Cabinet.

Olmert's defense minister, Ehud Barak, said an even broader Gaza operation was in the cards, aimed at crushing militant rocket squads but also to "weaken the Hamas rule, in the right circumstances, even to bring it down."

Israel regularly clashes with Gaza rocket squads, but intensified its operations last week after militants fired salvos into Ashkelon, a city of 120,000. By targeting a major city like Ashkelon, only 40 kilometers (25 miles) from the metropolis of Tel Aviv, Hamas raised the stakes and added pressure on Israeli leaders to respond.

Haniyeh's office was just one of about a dozen targets hit before dawn by Israeli aircraft and ground troops. Overnight, a 14-year-old Palestinian girl and five militants died of their wounds, and six Palestinians were killed in Israeli raids, including a 21-month-old girl who died of shrapnel wounds, according to medical officials in Gaza.

The bodies of two women also were unearthed from the rubble of an earlier Israeli airstrike, bringing the total death toll to 68 in two days and 102 Palestinians since Wednesday, according to the officials. At least half of them were militants. An additional 200 people were wounded, the officials said.

But the Israeli onslaught failed to protect southern Israel, where residents have lived with rocket barrages from Gaza since 2001.

More than 12 rockets were fired at southern Israel by Sunday evening, the military said, scoring direct hits on three houses, including one in the city of Ashkelon. Five Israelis were lightly wounded, according to Israeli rescue services.

The violence has threatened to bury U.S.-led peace efforts. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is due to arrive this week, but instead of promoting peace talks she will have to try to put out the latest fire.

The moderate Palestinian leadership in the West Bank, which is locked in a fierce rivalry with Hamas, called Israel's deadly assault Saturday a "holocaust" and "genocide" and announced they were suspending peace talks. It was unclear when the talks, relaunched last November at a U.S.-hosted summit, would resume.

"We entered the peace process to achieve peace and not to start wars," said Nabil Abu Rdeneh, a spokesman for President Mahmoud Abbas.

In a symbolic move, Abbas donated blood for Gaza residents at his West Bank office. "We are following the aggression against our people in Gaza," he told reporters.

"I've conducted contacts with various leaders, with the Security Council, with the EU and with Arab leaders to work to stop this aggression."

Olmert, commenting on the suspension of talks, said "attacking Hamas strengthens the chance for peace."

"I'm sure that beyond certain statements, the Palestinian leadership, the one with whom we want to achieve peace, also understands that," he said.

Abbas has ruled from the West Bank since his Hamas rivals violently seized control of Gaza last June. But the death toll in Gaza has threatened to unleash a backlash against him in the West Bank.

In addition to the deadly shooting near Hebron, thousands of schoolchildren demonstrated against Israel in Ramallah, home to Abbas' government. Some accused Abbas of being an Israeli agent, and protesters threw stones and cars, burned tires and forced shopkeepers to close their stores.

Egypt has cooperated with Israel's blockade of Hamas in Gaza, but opened its sealed border crossing with the territory Sunday to allow some of the Palestinian wounded access to medical care.

Egypt sent 27 ambulances to the Rafah crossing to transfer between 150 to 200 wounded, said Emad Kharboush, a medical official at a hospital in el-Arish, near the Israeli border.