3 Israelis, 3 Palestinians killed in Gaza violence

GAZA CITY: Warplanes pounded Gaza for a second day Thursday as three Israelis and three Palestinians were killed in fierce fighting which began with Israel's targeted killing of a top Hamas chief.

Israel's harshest assault on the Palestinian territory in four years, which comes as the Jewish state heads towards general elections, prompted an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council amid growing international concern.

Police said that since Israel's targeted killing of Hamas military chief Ahmed Jaabari on Wednesday afternoon, palestinians have fired around 180 rockets over the border, one of which hit a house on Thursday morning, killing three Israelis and injuring another four.

And the Israeli air force has pounded Gaza with more than 100 air strikes, killing 11 and injuring at least 115, medics and Hamas officials said.

"We have three killed," Israeli police spokeswoman Luba Samri told, saying four other people were also injured in a "direct hit on a house" in Kiryat Malachi, a town which lies 30 kilometres (18 miles) northeast of the Gaza Strip.

The attack on Kiryat Malachi was claimed by Hamas's armed wing, the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades in a statement on its website.

Israeli police said they had raised the level of alert across the entire country in order to deal with "the possibility of terror attacks" in response to Israel's killing of the Hamas chief.

"All the major cities in southern Israel were hit, and the majority of the more serious damage was in Beersheva," police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld told.