The ruling Palestinian militant group Hamas has been among the targets in renewed Israeli airstrikes in Gaza overnight. Several people are reported to have been injured in at least three explosions. A car carrying militants and two businesses owned by Hamas supporters were struck. It came after Hamas and other militant factions rejected a call from Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to stop firing rockets at Israel.

The region is in the grip of a new cycle of attack and counter attack that appears to have ended a truce agreed last November. Hamas says it will only halt rocket assaults if Israel first calls off military operations in the Palestinian territories. Israel says its actions are essential to preventing militant attacks

Abbas’s plea for peace came at a meeting with Hamas leaders in Gaza. He was also trying to shore up a fragile unity government involving Hamas and his own Fatah faction. Tensions between the two sides remain high after a recent upsurge in in-fighting.

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