(Xinhua) - Three members of Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) were killed and five others wounded in an Israeli missile attack on a car traveling on a street in Gaza city on Friday afternoon, hospital sources here said. Muawia Hassanin, spokesman for the ambulance service, told reporters that the paramedics have evacuated three dead bodies from a Volkswagen minibus, adding that five others were wounded in the missile attack, including bystanders. Witnesses said that an Israeli helicopter fired more than one rocket on the vehicle that was passing through a densely-populated area near Sheikh Radwan suburb in the north of Gaza city. According to Mushier al-Masri, a Hamas lawmaker, said that the three men were members of Ezz el-Deen al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas.
The latest Israeli operation brought to eight the number of people killed in aerial attacks on Gaza Strip since midnight. Four Hamas men died in pre-dawn air raid on a site for Hamas' military wing in eastern Gaza city and one bystander. Meanwhile, the hospital sources said a woman also died due to wounds she sustained during the first Israeli air strike on Gaza that took place on Thursday noon on a building for Hamas police force, known as the Executive Forces. In general, the death toll of the Israeli offensive since it was unleashed Thursday hit 16 people, most of them affiliated with Hamas. As for the inter-Palestinian infighting, two people were killed Friday in Gaza city in separated incidents.