Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday vowed a "mighty vengeance" against Hamas, a day after the latter launched a large-scale attack on Saturday which has killed at least 250 Israelis. The Palestinian militant group infiltrated several southern towns and fired over 5,000 rockets from Gaza strip towards the centre and southern regions of Israel under its 'Al-Aqsa Flood' operation while the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) retaliated with operation 'Swords Of Iron'.
"All of the places which Hamas is deployed, hiding and operating in, that wicked city, we will turn them into rubble," said Netanyahu, adding: "I say to the residents of Gaza: Leave now because we will operate forcefully everywhere."
"We will take mighty vengeance for this wicked day," said the Israeli Prime Minister.
"Hamas launched a cruel and wicked war. We will win this war but the price is too heavy to bear," he said. "Hamas wants to murder us all. This is an enemy that murders mothers and children in their homes, in their beds. An enemy that abducts elderly, children, teenage girls."
The Gaza strip saw retaliation from the Israeli forces after Hamas attack leaving over 230 Gazans dead.
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Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said the assault that had begun in Gaza, a narrow strip that is home to 2.3 million Palestinians, would spread to the West Bank and Jerusalem.
Haniyeh highlighted threats to Jerusalem's Al-Aqsa Mosque and Israeli normalisation in a speech saying, "How many times have we warned you that the Palestinian people have been living in refugee camps for 75 years, and you refuse to recognise the rights of our people?"
The Saturday violence has been the deadliest in Israel since the Yom Kippur war 50 years ago.