Israeli jets hit Gaza after rocket fire into Israel

Jerusalem: Israeli aircraft struck Hamas bases in Gaza early Friday, the military said, after a rocket fired by Palestinian militants hit a Jewish theological seminary in southern Israel. There were no reported casualties on either side. "Last night, a rocket was launched from the Gaza Strip into Israeli territory," Friday's military statement said.

It said that in response the Israeli Air Force "fighter jets and aircraft targeted terror infrastructure in military compounds and a Hamas naval force military compound as part of a strike on a number of Hamas terror sites throughout the Gaza Strip." The seminary, in the town of Sderot, was empty at the time of the rocket attack as students had left to return to their homes elsewhere to celebrate the Jewish sabbath — which begins on Friday— with their families.

"If the rocket had hit a few hours earlier there would have been a disaster," former defence minister Amir Peretz, a Sderot resident, said in an interview Friday with Israeli public radio.

Israeli police said the building was damaged when it was hit "with full force". The Sderot incident came hours after Israeli warplanes bombed bunkers at a Hamas base in southern Gaza on Thursday, causing no casualties.