Reuters’ Dan Williams contrasts the Israeli attack on Gaza at the end of 2008 with the campaign of the last two days, noting that this time Israel appears to be in ”no rush” to invade:

Two days into the assault, the absence of the saturated aerial bombing seen at the start of the last Gaza war in 2008 suggested the Israelis were not yet carving safer access points for ground troops.

The disparity in scale and pace with its offensive in 2008 reveals much about Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s delicate position.

Williams writes that Netanyahu has lost international support. The Israeli leader also faces a domestic political risk if the current conflict expands:

Though opinion polls favor Netanyahu for Israel’s January 22 election, that lead could bleed should soldiers end up in protracted house-to-house combat in Gaza’s warren-like towns.

“In Israel, popular support for a military campaign can be transient,” Yoaz Hendel, a military affairs commentator and former Netanyahu spokesman, told Reuters. “I can’t see a long-term reoccupation of Gaza taking place before the ballot.”

The IDF puts the latest number of rockets fired from Gaza since Wednesday morning at 274, with 105 reportedly intercepted by the Iron Dome system.

An index of Facebook pages organizing “emergency global actions for Gaza” lists 52 entries for today and many additional entries through the weekend.

(via @muiz)

The IDF continues its remarkable social media campaign: ”haters gonna hate”:

@captainbarakraz the haters gonna keep on hating.

— Peter Lerner (@MajPeterLerner) November 15, 2012

The IDF says no rockets struck the city of Tel Aviv. An Agence France-Presse correspondent reports that a rocket fall into the water near Jaffa.

Haaretz reports that warning sirens are also sounding in Be’er Sheva, to the east of Gaza. 

A few minutes ago, sirens in Tel Aviv sent residents running for shelter. We can confirm that no rockets struck in the area.

— IDF (@IDFSpokesperson) November 15, 2012

As sirens continue to sound in Tel Aviv, causing widespread alarm, IDF Chief Binyamin Gantz is convening a meeting of his general staff, Israel Radio reports. The possibility of a ground invasion of Gaza appears to be on the table.

Warning sirens of incoming missiles have sounded in Tel Aviv, Israel’s largest metropolitan area, for the first time since the 1991 Gulf War.

Reuters, quoting Israeli Army radio, reports that a rocket fired from the Gaza Strip struck Tel Aviv but there were no casualties.

Al-Jazeera reports a rocket landed in the water just south of Tel Aviv, near Jaffa.

Haaretz reports a rocket landed in Holon, also south of the city.

Turkey has recognized the Syrian opposition as the country’s legitimate leadership, the New York Times reports:

The announcement by Turkey, Syria’s northern neighbor and a haven for thousands of Syrian refugees and insurgents, was the third significant recognition of the new group this week. On Monday, members of the Gulf Cooperation Council — Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Oman, Qatar and Kuwait — recognized the group, known as the National Coalition of Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces. On Tuesday, France became the first Western country to do so.

Turkey’s semiofficial Anatolian News Agency said Ahmet Davutoglu, Turkey’s foreign minister… reiterated Turkey’s contention that Mr. Assad, once a close friend of Turkey’s, had lost all credibility and legitimacy because of his government’s repression of the opposition.

I’m going to hand over to my colleague Tom McCarthy now. Thanks for all the comments.

The Israeli prime minister has tweeted this picture, presumably of a baby injured in today’s rocket attack on Kiryat Malachi.

The move may be a response to coverage of the death of BBC cameraman Jihad Misharawi’s baby son Omar, a photo of whom has been circulating on Twitter (see earlier).

I saw today a picture of a bleeding Israeli baby. #Hamasdeliberately targets our children bit.ly/W9uYkAtwitter.com/netanyahu/stat…

— Benjamin Netanyahu (@netanyahu) November 15, 2012

The White House spokesman Jay Carney has condemned the rocket fire from Gaza, saying there is “no justification” for Hamas’s violence. He called on those responsible to stop the “cowardly acts” immediately.

Carney said Hamas claimed to have the best interests of the Palestinians at heart, but its use of violence was counterproductive to the Palestianian cause, the Associated Press reports.

Reuters is now backing up that al-Jazeera report stating that the Egyptian prime minister will be visiting Gaza tomorrow, accompanied by “security officials”. They attribute it to a cabinet official.

Morsi’s approach to the crisis has disappointed some Egyptians, reports my colleague Abdel-Rahman Hussein. But sending the PM to Gaza, if it halts the violence, may come to be seen as a diplomatic masterstroke.

Al-Jazeera is reporting that Egypt’s prime minister, Hesham Qandil, is to lead an Egyptian delegation into Gaza tomorrow as an act of solidarity with the Palestinians.

The Egyptians may have calculated that such a move will necessarily force Israel to pause its air assault on the Gaza Strip, and marks a real break from Mubarak-era policy towards Israel, without being openly hostile.

Reuters has more on the Gaza rocket that hit the outskirts of Rishon LeZion in central Israel. It was the northernmost point struck by a rocket in the present conflict.

The rocket exploded in an open area within the “municipal limits” of Rishon LeZion, the news agency reports. Air raids sounded in the city and residents heard the explosion, but there were no reports of damage or casualties.

Israeli media reports said the rocket came down near an amusement park in sand dunes on the edge of the city.

Leibovitch said:

We are not beginning any ground operation as for now, but it is an option. Other options still exist. We do have from time to time operational assessments and then we’ll decide of the next steps.

She was asked what would be the trigger for a ground operation – a rocket landing in Tel Aviv?

This is one possibility, of course. We do not want to be in this situation but it is possible … but it can be other things as well. We are as a military prepared for many types of scenarios.

She “recommended” to Hamas it halt its rocket fire.

Were the two sides talking at all? She refused to answer.

Avital Leibovitch, the Israeli military spokeswoman, has denied ground troops are being sent to the south at the moment. She is being interviewed by CNN at the moment. “We do have some ground troops on alert,” but they are not being sent to Gaza at present.

Jake Beckman of Bloomberg TV tweets that he has seen an Israeli army spokesman confirm on Israeli TV that “Israel is sending ground troops to the south”. We are unable to confirm that at the moment.

The Israeli defence forces have confirmed that a rocket from Gaza has struck near the city of Rishon LeZion, which is about nine miles (15km) south-east of Tel Aviv, as you can see from the map below.

Rishon LeZion is about 30 miles from the Gazan border.

Breaking: A rocket fired from Gaza struck an open area near Rishon LeZion, a city with more than 200,000 people.#IsraelUnderFire

— IDF (@IDFSpokesperson) November 15, 2012

Here’s William Hague condemning Hamas earlier.

My colleague Mona Mahmood points out this video (warning: graphic), uploaded today, purporting to show Syrian soldiers beating unarmed civilians in Hama in the west of the country. We cannot verify the footage.

The BBC has incredibly moving video footage of BBC Arabic cameraman Jihad Misharawi, whose son was killed by an Israeli air strike.

He told BBC Arabic:

Shrapnel hit our house. My sister-in-law was killed along with my son. And my brother and my other son were wounded.

What did my son to to die like this? What was his mistake? He is 10 or 11 months-old, what did he do?

A picture has been posted on Twitter of his son, Omar.

This was Jihad’s 11 month old son Omar who was killed in#Gaza yesterday when a shell came through the rooftwitter.com/pdanahar/statu…

— Paul Danahar (@pdanahar) November 15, 2012

A video showing the work of Israel’s iron dome defence mechanism, which the IDF says has intercepted more than 80 rockets from Gaza over the past 24 hours, has been posted on YouTube.

Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu claimed during his press conference that he had the support of Lady Ashton, Francois Hollande and Tony Blair.

Perhaps Hollande has backed him in private but the French president’s foreign minister Laurent Fabius did not sound like he was offering support to Israel. Fabius was quoted as saying:

It would be a catastrophe if there is an escalation in the region. Israel has the right to security but it won’t achieve it through violence. The Palestinians also have the right to a state.

Hamas health officials say a a two year-old child has been killed by an Israeli air strike, the BBC’s Jon Donnison reports.

Reuters, citing the Gaza health ministry, says the death toll in the enclave since the start of the Israeli operation has risen to 15, including eight civilians among them a pregnant woman with twins, an 11-month old boy and three infants.

A Palestinian medic helps a wounded woman after an Israeli air strike on the southern Gaza Strip city of Khan Yunis on 15 November, 2012. Photograph: Emad Drimly/Xinhua Press/Corbis

Three IDF soldiers have been taken to hospital after being injured by a rocket fired from Gaza into Israel, the IDF says.

It says 245 rockets have been fired since yesterday, more than 80 of which have been intercepted by its iron dome defence system.

He says he has spoken to Barack Obama and thanks the US president for his “unequivocal” clear-sighted support for Israel’s right to defend itself.

He thanks Lady Ashton, Francois Hollande and Tony Blair (who is Middle East envoy for the Quartet) for their support.

He hopes terrorist organisations in Gaza have “got the message”. But if not Israel’s operation will continue and Israel will take whatever measures are necessary.

That seems to be the end of the English section of the press conference.

The Israeli PM is giving a press conference now.

Netanyahu says Israel will continue to take whatever action is necessary to protect its people.

Seven years ago Israel withdrew from Gaza, he recalls. Hamas turned Gaza into a “terror stronghold”.

They fired thousands of missiles at Israel and deliberately placed these missile launchers in civilian buildings.

There is no moral equivalence between Israel and the terrorist organisations in Gaza, he says.

They commit “a double war crime”: they fire at Israeli civilians and they hide behind Gazan civilians.

Israel takes every care to avoid targeting civilians, he says.

Here is a summary of today’s key events so far.

Israel

• Israeli airstrikes continued in Gaza today following the attack yesterday that killed Hamas’s military chief Ahmed al-Jabari. The attack came after a series of rocket attacks from Gaza into southern Israel over recent days. The Israeli army said 156 targets were hit in Gaza, 126 of them rocket launchers. Thirteen people were killed in Gaza yesterday including a pregnant woman with twins, an 11-month old boy and two infants, with 130 wounded, according to Gaza’s health ministry.A truce was not on the agenda, Israeli military spokeswoman Avital Leibovitz said. Hamas’s leader, Khaled Meshaal, vowed to “continue the resistance”. Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, who rules the West Bank but not Gaza, cut short a European trip to return to the West Bank in response to the crisis.

• Three Israelis were killed by a rocket attack from Gaza, the first Israeli fatalities in the present conflict. The deaths came when a four-storey building was hit in the town of Kiryat Malachi, 15 miles (25km) north of Gaza; a four-year-old boy and two babies were also wounded. Israel said 200 rockets had struck Israel since yesterday, 135 since midnight. Eighteen rockets had been shot down today by Israel’s “iron dome” counter-missile missile system, Israel said. Hamas claimed it had fired a one-tonne rocket at Tel Aviv, but there were no reports of an impact in the city.

• Hamas declared a state of emergency in Gaza and Israel did the same in the country’s south. There were reports Hamas was barring foreigners from leaving.

• Egypt’s president, Mohamed Morsi, called Israel’s attacks on Gaza “unacceptable” and said he stood by the Gazan people. The Muslim Brotherhood, with which Morsi is aligned, called for Egypt to sever diplomatic ties with Israel. Egypt has officially requested a meeting of the UN security council to discuss what it described as Israeli aggression on Gaza, the foreign ministry said. After 33 years of peace, the relationship between Israel and Egypt has cooled since the ousting of dictator Hosni Mubarak and this is the first test of relations between Israel and a semi-democratic Egypt. Qatar, Jordan, Iran and Syria also condemned the Israeli operation.

• William Hague placed the blame for the situation on Hamas.Yesterday the Obama administration backed the Israeli airstrikes, a state department spokesman denouncing rocket attacks from Gaza and supporting Israel’s right to self-defence.

• Thousands of mostly young men attended Jabari’s funeral amid gunfire and chaotic scenes.

• An Israeli peace activist, Gershon Baskin, claimed that Jabari had received a draft truce agreement between Israel and Hamas that Baskin had also shown to Israeli defence minister Ehud Barak. Heattempted to characterise Jabari as a moderate who had come round to the cause of peace.

Syria

• Turkey sent fighter jets to its south-eastern border with Syria for a second day, following days of Syrian bombing of a town on the Syrian side of the border. There was no sign of fighting there today. Videos purported to show rebel Free Syrian Army soldiers taking control of an army post in the town, Ras al-Ain. These could not be independently verified.

• Activists posted videos purporting to show shelling in the suburbs of the capital today, resulting in at least one death. These videos could not be independently verified.

• France’s foreign minister announced that Paris is to discuss supplying arms to Syrian opposition forces with other European capitals in the coming weeks, following the formation of the new opposition coalition on Sunday. Russian foreign ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich said today that any foreign help to the opposition fighting Bashar Assad’s government would represent a “gross violation” of basic principles of international law.

Jordan

• Ongoing riots in Jordan following the government’s decision to increase fuel prices left one person dead today. The death is the first in violence that has spread to several poor towns in the kingdom since Tuesday night.

Hours before Hamas military commander Ahmed al-Jabari was killed he received the draft of a permanent truce agreement with Israel, Israeli peace activist Gershon Baskin told Haaretz.

Baskin helped mediate between Israel and Hamas in the deal to release Gilad Shalit.

Baskin told Haaretz on Thursday that senior officials in Israel knew about his contacts with Hamas and Egyptian intelligence aimed at formulating the permanent truce, but nevertheless approved the assassination …

According to Baskin, during the past two years Jabari internalised the realisation that the rounds of hostilities with Israel were beneficial neither to Hamas nor to the inhabitants of the Gaza Strip and only caused suffering, and several times he acted to prevent firing by Hamas into Israel.

He said that even when Hamas was pulled into participating in the launching of rockets, its rockets would always land in open spaces. “And that was intentional,” clarified Baskin.

In recent months Baskin was continuously in touch with Hamas officials and with Egyptian intelligence as well as with officials in Israel, whose names he refused to divulge. A few months ago Baskin showed defence minister Ehud Barak a draft of the agreement and on the basis of that draft an inter-ministry committee on the issue was established. The agreement was to have constituted a basis for a permanent truce between Israel and Hamas, which would prevent the repeated rounds of shooting.

“In Israel,” Baskin said, “they decided not to decide, and in recent months I took the initiative to push it again.”

The Local Coordination Committees of Syria, a Syrian protest group, has been reporting shelling in Saqba, in the Damascus suburbs, on their Facebook page.

This very graphic and disturbing video shows the body of a young man with his arm wholly or partially severed from his body. The LCCS name him as Mohammad bin Mohammad Saleem Haroun and say he was killed in Saqba.

This video purports to shows the aftermath of shelling in the area, with people walking among the rubble of recently-destroyed buildings and a man showing the camera his wounded torso.

And this video purports to show a warplane shelling another Damascus suburb, eastern Ghota, today.

All these videos were uploaded, today, but none can be independently verified.

Hamas chief Khaled Meshaal has condemned the killing of military commander Ahmed al-Jaabari and vowed to continue the resistance against Israel after the offensive against Palestinian militants in Gaza. At a meeting of Islamic leaders in the Sudanese capital Khartoum, he said:

Men and women in Palestine, we will continue the resistance

Hamas has declared a state of emergency in Gaza and the Israeli government has done likewise in southern Israel. This extract from APgives an idea of what life is like on the ground for citizens on both sides of the border:

Most Gazans remained in their homes, following developments on Hamas-run TV and local radio stations. Many also provided updates on their Facebook and Twitter accounts, providing news about airstrikes and rocket launches. Others shared prayers and called for militants to stand tough against Israel.

“My little 4-year-old boy keeps asking me to pray with him every 10 minutes, saying, ‘Mama. Let’s pray together to Allah in order to be safe,’” one woman, Ghadeer Ahmad, wrote on her Facebook account.
While streets were quiet, bakeries and groceries remained open. No food shortages were reported, and electricity, which suffers frequent outages even during normal times, remained sporadic. Many families keep home generators to maintain power.

“I am trying to calm my children when they hear the sound of explosions,” said Zainab Nimr, a 33-year-old mother of three. “We have enough food and water for four days, so I asked my husband to go out and get extra supplies. No one knows when this will end.” …

Israel declared a state of emergency in the country’s south, where more than 1 million Israelis live within rocket range, instructing people to remain close to fortified areas. School was canceled in communities within a 40-kilometer (25-mile) radius of Gaza.

People living in areas along the frontier were ordered to stay home from work, save for essential services, and shopping centres were closed. Israeli police stepped up patrols around the country, fearing Hamas could retaliate with bombing attacks far from the reaches of Gaza.

Batya Katar, a resident of Sderot, a community that has been a frequent target of rocket fire, said streets were empty there.
“People won’t be outside. The minute they assassinated the Hamas military chief we knew an offensive had begun. We were waiting for it, and it’s about time they did it. We have the right to live like other countries in the world,” she said.

A rocket is launched from Gaza as seen from Sderot on 15 November, 2012 in Israel. Photograph: Uriel Sinai/Getty Images

Qatar, an increasingly influential player in the Middle East in recent times, having sent troops to Libya and arms to Syria, has strongly condemned Israel’s military operation.

Prime minister Hamad bin Jassem al-Thani was quoted as saying:

This vicious attack must not pass unpunished…The UN security council must take up its responsibility to secure peace and security in the world …We reject extremism and terrorism but such irresponsible and unjustified attacks must be condemned by the world.

In criticising Israel, Qatar joins Jordan, which warned that Israel would “drag the region into the cycle of violence and instability again”, Iran, which accused Israel of “organised terrorism”, and Syria, which denounced “barbaric, reprehensible crimes”.

Turkey sent fighter jets to its south-eastern border with Syria for a second day today, Reuters reports, following days of bombing by Syrian warplanes of the rebel-held town of Ras al-Ain, which is right on the Turkish border, prompting worries that the conflict might spill over into Turkey.

A Reuters reporter in Ceylanpinar, just over the border in Turkey, said he saw two Turkish jets overhead. He said there was no sign of fighting in Ras al-Ain today.

This video, uploaded today, purports to show the rebel Free Syrian Army taking control of an army post in the town after seven days of fighting. The accompanying description says large quantities of heavy weapons were seized, along with machine guns and military vehicles.

This video, also uploaded today, purports to show the same.

This one, uploaded yesterday, purports to show rebels capturing a number of pro-Assad soldiers in Ras al-Ain.

We cannot verify these videos.

The Guardian’s Harriet Sherwood tweets that there are worrying reports Hamas is not allowing foreigners to leave Gaza.

#Gaza. Hamas apparently saying no foreigners can leave Gaza. Human shields?

— Harriet Sherwood (@harrietsherwood) November 15, 2012

Harriet Sherwood told me the scenes at the funeral of Hamas military wing commander Ahmed al-Jabari are frightening and there is a sense of fear pervading in Gaza city.

[It's] pretty chaotic and pretty frightening. There are thousands of, mostly, young men at the cemetery. It’s a very big cemetery and they are crowded around the grave and I have just seen Jabari’s body brought in. People [are] straining to stroke his face, clutching at his hands. There is a lot of gunfire …just a short while ago we saw in the distance some tracers from Israel’s iron dome defence mechanism which shoots down rockets coming out of Gaza …

They’re are obviously a lot of Hamas guys, wearing the trademark Hamas baseball caps, shooting their guns, as I said, but I am pretty sure none of the senior Hamas figures will be in public today because they will know that they are being targeted by Israel …

There’s been quite a lot of air strikes but also another technique Israel employs is sonic booms from aircraft, which are very frightening because they make a very loud noise and you don’t know whether it’s an explosion or just a sonic boom and I saw quite a lot of that. Gaza, apart from the funeral, is very quiet today, most shops are shut. There’s not many people in the streets of Gaza city …

People are very worried. I spoke to quite few people who have said frightening it is at night. I spoke to a man, a 64 year-old gynecologist, who said this is worse than the bombing in operation cast lead and he said his adult daughter, his 27 year-old daughter came into bed to sleep between her mother and father because she was so afraid.

Obviously, there is a lot of fear on the other side of the border too.

Palestinian mourners carry the body of Hamas’ top military commander Ahmed al-Jabari, killed in an Israeli strike on Wednesday, during his funeral in Gaza City, Thursday, 15 November 15, 2012. Photograph: Hatem Moussa/AP

William Hague, the British foreign secretary, has put out a statement saying that Hamas “bears principal responsibility for the current crisis”. Hague says:

I utterly condemn rocket attacks from Gaza into southern Israel by Hamas and other armed groups. This creates an intolerable situation for Israeli civilians in southern Israel, who have the right to live without fear of attack from Gaza. The rocket attacks also risk worsening the plight of Palestinian civilians in Gaza, which is already precarious.
 
Hamas and other armed groups in Gaza should cease attacks against Israel immediately. I call on those in the region with influence over Hamas to use that influence to bring about an end to the attacks.

He then turns to Israel:

I also strongly urge Israel to do their utmost to reduce tension, avoid civilian casualties and increase the prospects for both sides to live in peace. It is imperative to avoid the risk of a spiral of violence. The escalation of the conflict would be in no one’s interest, particularly at a time of instability in the region.

And he calls for urgent progress towards a two-state solution and “an urgent resumption of negotiations”.

The Egyptian president, Mohamed Morsi, gave a televised address to the nation this morning, calling Israel’s attacks on Gaza unacceptable and predicting they would lead to instability in the region. Morsi, who belongs to the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice party, an ideological ally of Hamas, said:

We are in contact with the people of Gaza and with Palestinians and we stand by them until we stop the aggression and we do not accept under any circumstances the continuation of this aggression on the Strip.

The Israelis must realise that this aggression is unacceptable and would only lead to instability in the region and would negatively and greatly impact the security of the region.

Morsi said he had spoken to Barack Obama on the phone and they had discussed “ways to reach calm and end the aggression”.

The Obama administration backed the Israeli airstrikes yesterday. State department spokesman Mark Toner denounced militants in Gaza for firing rockets into Israel and said the US supported Israel’s right to self-defence.

There had been speculation that in his second term Obama would make a renewed effort to revive the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, but so far there don’t seem to have been any major changes in his approach to the conflict.

 The Muslim Brotherhood has called for protests urging the Egyptian government to sever diplomatic ties with Israel.

Has no one told them that the Muslim Brotherhood is in power in Egypt?

Asked about the prospect of truce talks, Israeli military spokeswoman Avital Leibovitz told al-Jazeera:

Nothing like that is on the current agenda.

The Israeli Defence Forces have uploaded videos of their air strikes on Gaza. They are said to target “terrorist infrastructure”. They give no indication of casualties – civilian or otherwise.

The baby of a BBC Arabic cameraman was killed by the Israeli air strikes on Gaza on Wednesday, the corporation says.

Jihad al-Masharawi, a Palestinian employee of BBC Arabic in Gaza, carries the body of his 11-month-old son Omar, who according to hospital officials was killed by an Israeli air strike in Gaza City 15 November, 2012. Photograph: Mohammed Salem/Reuters

Ongoing riots in Jordan following the government’s decision to increase fuel prices left one person dead today. The death is the first in violence that has spread to several poor towns in the kingdom since Tuesday night.

Yesterday hundreds took to the streets in protest against government increases in the prices of gasoline, cooking gas and heating fuel, blocking roads, setting government buildings on fire and vandalising shops in Maan, Tafila and Karak.

The protester who was killed died in an attack on a police station during which dozens were injured in Irbid, Jordan’s second-largest city, which is in the north-west near the borders with Syria, the Golan Heights, Israel and the West Bank.

In the capital, Amman, riot police chased dozens of youths throwing stones in the main commercial district overnight, after police foiled an attempt by Islamist and tribal opposition figures to stage an anti-government rally.

This map shows where all those places are.

So far demonstrators have occasionally chanted against King Abdullah, Reuters reports, but “there seems to be little enthusiasm for revolution”.

But Islam Sawalah, a resident of Amman, was not so sure about that. He told my colleague Mona Mahmood that “the wind of the Arab spring is reaching Jordan”:

When Yemenis were protesting against their government, they were raising banners saying “Yemenis are not Jordanians” because it is well known in the Arab world that when the prices rise in Jordan, people keep silent and they go at the night before to store more petrol for their cars.

People were upset within themselves, never expressing their feelings in public. The Arab spring has encouraged the Jordanians to shout and protest. The government was shocked by the reaction of the people. They thought a few people would protest in Amman and that is it. They did not expect the people demanding the toppling of the regime, which means the king himself. In other provinces, people even burned his pictures and attacked and smashed few buildings and gunfire. [Yesterday] protesters burned the house of the governor in Ma’an province.

I believe what is happening in Jordan is like the April uprising in 1989 [protests that led to the legalisation of political parties]. The problem now is with the king himself as people believe that he himself is behind the decision to riase the prices. He has the solution and all the cards are in his hand. The king is the only one who can solve the problem. He thinks this is the right solution.

Abdullah Ensour, the prime minister, has said the lifting of the hefty subsidies – which cost at least $2bn annually – was unavoidable to avert economic collapse caused by a ballooning budget deficit.

Protesters clash with police in Amman, Jordon, on 14 November 2012. Photograph: Mohammad Abu Ghosh/Xinhua Press/Corbis

The Guardian’s Harriet Sherwood is at the funeral of Ahmed al-Jabari, the commander of the military wing of Hamas, whose assassination began Israel’s offensive against the Gaza strip. A doctor there told her the Israeli bombing has been worse than in Operation Cast Lead.

#Gazaat Jabari’s funeral. Lots of Hamas flags and occasional booms of airstrikes

— Harriet Sherwood (@harrietsherwood) November 15, 2012

#Gaza. Massive bursts of gunfire in air. Crowd chanting alluha akbar

— Harriet Sherwood (@harrietsherwood) November 15, 2012

#Gaza. Jabari’s body carried aloft wrapped in bloodstained sheet and Hamas flag. So many weapons

— Harriet Sherwood (@harrietsherwood) November 15, 2012

#gaza. 64 year old doctor in crowd says bombing is worse than in Cast Lead 4 years ago

— Harriet Sherwood (@harrietsherwood) November 15, 2012

#Gaza. ‘We are under siege’ says Dr Jamil, a gynaecologist

— Harriet Sherwood (@harrietsherwood) November 15, 2012

Scene outside the mosque in #Gaza where funeral for Jabari taking place twitter.com/pdanahar/statu…

— Paul Danahar (@pdanahar) November 15, 2012

A lot of eyes are on the response by the Muslim Brotherhood government in Egypt, especially given its historic ties to Hamas, butAbdel Rahman- Hussein, in Cairo, says now that the group is in power it seems to be adopting a pragmatic approach taking “pretty much the same measures that Hosni Mubarak took during Operation Cast Lead” in 2008-09. He said:

The Brotherhood are facing criticism already that they are not doing anything that is too different from a regime that was overthrown by the Egyptian people and was deemed complicit in the siege of the people of Gaza …The Muslim Brotherhood has always criticised the Mubarak regime basically for letting things happen on its border because Gaza’s on the border with Egypt and the Sinai border and I think a stronger Egyptian position would have made Israel think twice about carrying out such an operation, not knowing what would happen on the other side of the border …

There will be demonstrations [in Cairo] today and tomorrow but that’s what happened in 2008. The Muslim Brotherhood along with a lot of secular opposition forces held a series of protests against the Israeli offensive during that time but they weren’t in power back then. They’re in power now and it seems that, basically, they’re pretty much going down the same route [as the Mubarak regime].

Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, has cut short a trip to Europe to return to the West Bank and deal with the Gaza crisis, Palestinian officials told the Associated Press.

Abbas governs the West Bank while Hamas rules Gaza, but Abbas sees himself as president of all Palestinians.

Saeb Erekat, a Palestinian official, condemned Israel’s military offensive in Gaza and told AP the Palestinians “hold Israel fully responsible for the consequences of this act of aggression”.

Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president. Photograph: Fadi Arouri/Xinhua Press/Corbis

Conflict continues in Syria, and France’s foreign minister has announced that Paris is to discuss supplying arms to Syrian opposition forces with other European capitals in the coming weeks, following the formation of the new opposition coalition on Sunday.

Laurent Fabius told RTL Radio:

At the moment there is an embargo on arms, so no weapons are being delivered from Europe. The question will undoubtedly be raised for defensive arms but it’s something we can only do in coordination with the rest of Europe … We want to avoid going towards militarisation. On the other hand we must prevent liberated zones from being destroyed. We must find a fair balance.

He said Paris was talking to Moscow and United Nations special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi over a solution, as it waited for the Syrian coalition to form a provisional government in the weeks ahead that could open the door to supplying arms.

On Tuesday Paris became the first western capital to recognise the new National Coalition of Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces as the “sole representative of the Syrian people”.

On Friday representatives of the new coalition will meet William Hague, the British foreign secretary, in London.

French president Francois Hollande will meet George Sabra, the new leader of the Syrian National Council – now a minority player in the wider coalition – in Paris on Saturday, Fabius said.

Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times has written his latest columnfrom Bab al-Salam in northern Syria. This is his take on the role of Islamists among the Syrian rebels:

It’s … true that Islamic militants and foreign fighters are playing an increasing, but still tiny, role in the combat. Some of that is real, and some is Kabuki: Groups of fighters have realized that the best way to get weapons is to grow beards, quote from the Koran and troll for support in Saudi Arabia and Qatar.

The west’s existing hands-off approach has failed, Kristof asserts. “Western passivity has backfired and accelerated all that Washington fears: chaos, regional instability, sectarianism and growing influence of Islamic militants.”

What is his solution?

The United States certainly shouldn’t send boots on the ground. But there are steps we can take to save lives, hasten an end to the war, reduce the risks to the region and protect American interests as well. A sensible menu includes a NATO-backed no-fly zone over parts of northern Syria, transfers of weapons and ammunition (though not antiaircraft weapons) to the Free Syrian Army, training and intelligence support, and cooperation with rebels to secure chemical weapons.

Egypt’s foreign minister, Kamel Amr, has called on the US to intervene and end “Israeli aggression” on the Gaza Strip, state media has reported. 

Amr “requested that the United States immediately intervene to stop Israeli aggression on the Palestinian people in Gaza”, Mena news agency reported, adding that Amr spoke to US secretary of state Hillary Clinton by telephone.

In an interview with the Scroll, Nathan Thrall, from the International Crisis Group, says there is likely to be a large escalation. He also says that the forthcoming Israeli election clearly influenced the military operation.

What is the difference this time? This time we had hundreds of thousands of residents of southern Israel who are going into shelters and their kids weren’t going to school. Forget about left and right in Israel. Basically, the entire political spectrum in Israel was saying very clearly that this was unacceptable and was in favor of doing something …

I think it’s not unfair to say that the real difference this time is that we have a Likud primary in two weeks and Israeli elections coming up very shortly. It’s simply untenable for there not to be a response as there had not been …

Likud looked very impotent the last few days. Everyone I talked to in Israel — whatever their political persuasion — was of the view that something had to be done. I don’t see how it could have been ignored. I don’t want to overthink it by saying, ‘Well, this is the eve of Olmert’s announcement of his reentering the race and he is someone who actually did quote-unquote “take care of Gaza”, he is someone who actually did eliminate a nuclear program instead of just talking about it.’ Whether Olmert specifically plays any role, it’s certainly the case that the elections made a difference.

An Israeli soldier today at the perimeter of a marked off area where a Grad missile hit an apartment in the southern Israeli town of Kiryat Malachai and killed three people. Photograph: Jim Holland/EPA

The funeral of the Hamas military commander assassinated at the start of Israel’s operation against Gaza has been taking place, AP reports:

Few in the Palestinian territory’s largest urban area, Gaza City, came out following the call for dawn prayers on Thursday, and the only vehicles plying the streets were ambulances and media cars.

About 400 angry mourners braved the streets, however, to bury Hamas mastermind Ahmed al-Jabari, whose body was draped in the green flag of the Islamic militant Hamas movement. Some fired guns in the air and chanted, “God is Great, the revenge is coming.” When the body was brought into a mosque for funeral prayers, some tried to touch or kiss it. Others cried.

Foreign journalists, including the Guardian’s Harriet Sherwood, have been allowed in to Gaza via the Erez border crossing.

Huge airstrike in distance seen while crossing into #Gaza

— Harriet Sherwood (@harrietsherwood) November 15, 2012

Three big smoke clouds over #Gaza city in front of me. Sound of fighter jets in the air

— Paul Danahar (@pdanahar) November 15, 2012

Two rounds just fell short of #gaza about a kilometer to my left in the no man’s land bit of #Gaza

— Paul Danahar (@pdanahar) November 15, 2012

Driving thru #Gaza City. Most shops closed. IDF saying airstrikes are to increase

— Harriet Sherwood (@harrietsherwood) November 15, 2012

In the context of the last update, there is an interesting article on Israel National News about how Israel set up a situation room to “communicate to the rest of the world in real time what exactly is happening in the new IDF operation”.

Staff in the situation room are in touch with thousands of bloggers and other pro-Israel activists around the world involved in social media. The messages are sent to these activists, and forwarded on to social networks, blogs, web sites, and other internet outlets. The messages include statements from officials, testimonies from resident under fire, photos, videos, and links to news stories. The messages are sent out in a variety of languages.

The IDF is attracting criticism for the jokey tone of updates by some of its members on Twitter, amid the bloodshed. Here are a couple of examples (you can see more on the IDF tweeters list).

#HamasBumperStickers My car is a stairway to heaven, with a little help from #Israel #IsraelUnderFire

— Peter Lerner (@MajPeterLerner) November 15, 2012

#HamasBumperStickers boom!

— Captain Barak Raz (@CaptainBarakRaz) November 15, 2012

And here are some responses:

@captainbarakraz This is not a joke people.What in hell is wrong with you? Do you think war is funny?

— alice mcgregor (@alicebmcgregor) November 15, 2012

@captainbarakraz I think it does not serve #IDF and any Israeli official if it goes down to these levels. The situation is much too serious.

— Marc Berthold (@mb_boell) November 15, 2012

The frat-boy snark from various Israeli army spokespeople and their supporters is pretty revolting.

— Gregg Carlstrom (@glcarlstrom) November 15, 2012

Egypt has opened the Rafah border crossing to allow Palestinian victims of air strikes to get medical attention, al-Jazeera is reporting.

Egypt has officially requested a meeting of the UN security council to discuss what it described as Israeli aggression on Gaza, the foreign ministry said in a statement, according to Reuters. The news agency reports:

The foreign ministry said Egypt’s representative to the United Nations had sent formal requests to UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon and to the current head of the council, India’s representative. 

The security council held an emergency meeting last night to discuss Israeli strikes against the Gaza Strip but took no action.

The Guardian’s Harriet Sherwood is trying to get access to the Gaza Strip via the Erez border crossing. She told me over the phone that the death of the three Israelis in a rocket attack is likely to lead to an escalation. She said:

There’s been quite a lot of rocket fire over our heads this morning, which has been intercepted by the Israeli military but just up the road from where I am there has been a building that has been struck and there are unconfirmed reports [the IDF and Israeli police have since confirmed the reports] that three Israelis have been killed. Now, if that’s true, that’s a very, very big development and I think it heralds a much bigger confrontation between Israel and Gaza that we have seen even in the past 24 hours …

Here on the Israeli side [of the border], there’s a lot of sirens going off, people taking shelter. We are getting a lot of alerts of rockets coming in pretty regularly and we can see quite a lot of action in the sky. But at the moment I don’t know what’s happening in Gaza except for later this morning there’s the funeral of the Hamas military commander who was killed yesterday, which will be a very big event, I imagine.

The Israeli defence forces spokesperson Twitter feed says the IDF has distributed leaflets urging citizens to “avoid being present in the vicinity of Hamas operatives”. It says 133 rockets have been fired on Israel in the last 24 hours.

Short while ago, IDF dispersed leaflets above the #Gazastrip idfblog.com/2012/11/15/idf…

— IDF (@IDFSpokesperson) November 15, 2012

Photo: Arabic leaflet dropped over #Gaza urges civilians to “avoid being present in the vicinity of #Hamas operatives”twitter.com/IDFSpokesperso…

— IDF (@IDFSpokesperson) November 15, 2012

Israel and militants in Gaza are trading fire after yesterday’s assassination of Ahmed al-Jabari, commander of Hamas’s military wing.

Here is a summary of the latest updates:

• Israeli aircraft, tanks and naval gunboats pounded the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip today as Israel continues the operation launched yesterday. Israel targeted a motorcycle carrying a rocket squad, killing one militant and wounding two, a Palestinian health official said. The Israeli military had no immediate confirmation of the report. Israel said the operation which began with the assassination yesterday of Hamas’s top military commander was a response to several days of rocket fire from the coastal territory.

• A rocket fired from the Gaza Strip on Thursday struck an apartment building in southern Israel, killing three people, Israeli media said. 
It was the first report of Israeli fatalities since Israel launched its air assault on the Gaza Strip a day earlier. Israeli police said more than 80 rockets and mortars were fired from Gaza after Jabari’s death. Israel’s military said its Iron Dome interceptor had shot down 27 of the missiles.

• At least 10 Palestinians, including two young children and seven militants, were killed yesterday and more than 93 were wounded. Reuters put the death toll at 13.

• ”Today we relayed a clear message to the Hamas organisation and other terrorist organisations,” Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu, a rightwinger who is seeking re-election on 22 January, said in a televised statement. Hamas said the attack would “open the gates of hell” for Israel.

• The United Nations security council held an emergency meeting on Wednesday night to discuss the onslaught and heard a plea from the Palestinian UN observer to stop “war crimes being perpetrated by Israel against the Palestinian people”.