Israel launches deadly air strike on Gaza

At least one person has died and several people were injured, including children, after an Israeli aircraft fired at two men in the southern Gaza strip, Palestinian hospital officials said on Sunday.

According to the Israeli army, the two men were involved in rocket attacks into Israel.

The two men were riding a motorcycle near the town of Rafah, which borders Egypt's Sinai peninsula, when the attack occurred.

Israeli uses manned and unmanned aircraft to strike at militants in the Gaza Strip which is controlled by the Iranian-backed Islamist Hamas group. Hamas has for months taken a back seat in attacking Israel, leaving other groups to take the lead.

But Israel holds Hamas responsible for security in Gaza which the Islamists seized in 2007 from the Western-backed Mahmoud Abbas, who remains the Palestinian leader in the occupied West Bank.

There was no immediate comment from Hamas on the strike, but in the past Gaza's ruling faction has accused Israel of escalating violence in the Gaza Strip and provoking militants to carry out further attacks.

One of them and a bystander were in a critical condition, the officials said.

A number of bystanders were injured included three children, a woman and an elderly man.

The Israeli military said the two men were members of "Global Jihadist" groups based in the Gaza Strip who had for years attacked Israeli civilians and troops and were also involved in weapons manufacturing.

The military named the two men as Talat Jarbi and Mohammed Maqawi.

Palestinian medical sources told the AFP news agency that Talat Halil Jarbi had lost both legs in Sunday's air strike.

Israel and Hamas, which governs Gaza, have mostly observed an unwritten truce since Israel attacked the Gaza strip, where the Israeli military offensive named Operation Cast Lead killed more than 1,400 Palestinians, majority of them civilians, including 400 children.

Thirteen Israelis were also killed, three of them civilians.