As children were again rushed into hospital in Gaza, it was almost as if there had never been a three-day truce.<br /><br />The most vulnerable are again paying the biggest price for renewed fighting between Israel and Hamas.<br /><br />As one side blames the other for the failure of talks in Cairo, the death toll rose by at least five in Gaza on Friday, including a ten-year-old boy.<br /><br />Israel says Hamas fired first and uses civilians as human shields. It rejects claims its response is disproportionate.<br /><br />“First of all we must continue to act with force,” Justice Minister Tzipi Livni told Israel’s Channel 2 television on Friday evening. <br /><br />“They are firing at us and they have to get hit in return – and not in the same proportion – but to a greater extent.”<br /><br />Two Israelis were injured by mortars on Friday. Officials say dozens of rockets were unleashed across the border. Israel insists it won’t negotiate under fire.<br /><br />Islamic Jihad and the Popular Resistance Committees claim they were behind the salvoes rather than Hamas.<br /><br />A month after the start of hostilities, the UN says more than 1,900 Palestinians, mainly civilians, have died as have 67 people on the Israeli side, almost all of them soldiers.
