Mohammed Saber/European Pressphoto Agency
Two children look through the rubble of their house after an airstrike in Beit Lahiya, Gaza, on Sunday.
GAZA CITY — Israel pressed its assault on the Gaza Strip for a fifth day on Sunday, deploying warplanes and naval vessels to pummel the coastal enclave and striking at two media offices here as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned of a possible “significant” expansion in the onslaught and President Obama defended Israel’s right to protect itself.
Speaking in Bangkok, Mr. Obama said Israel was within its rights to respond to an attack on its territory.
“There’s no country on earth that would tolerate missiles raining down on its citizens from outside its borders,” Mr. Obama said in his first public comments since the violence broke out. “We are fully supportive of Israel’s right to defend itself.”
The president also said that efforts were under way to address Israel’s security concerns and end the violence. “We’re going to have to see what kind of progress we can make in the next 24, 36, 48 hours,” Mr. Obama said.
Even as the diplomacy intensified on Sunday, the attacks continued in Gaza and Israel.
Mr. Netanyahu’s warning came as militants in Gaza aimed at least one rocket at the Israeli heartland in Tel Aviv, one day after Israeli forces broadened the attack beyond military targets, bombing centers of government infrastructure including the four-story headquarters of the Hamas prime minister.
“We are exacting a heavy price from Hamas and the terrorist organizations and the Israel Defense Forces are prepared for a significant expansion of the operation,” Mr. Netanyahu told his cabinet at its routine Sunday meeting, referring directly to the call-up of thousands of reservists that, coupled with a massing of armor on the Gaza border, many analysts have interpreted as preparations for a possible invasion.
“I appreciate the rapid and impressive mobilization of the reservists who have come from all over the country and turned out for the mission at hand,” Mr. Netanyahu said. “Reservist and conscript soldiers are ready for any order they might receive.”
His remarks were reported shortly after a battery of Israel’s “Iron Dome” defense shield, hastily deployed near Tel Aviv on Saturday in response to the threat of longer-range rockets, intercepted at least one projectile aimed at the city on Sunday, Israeli officials said. The episode was the latest of several salvos that have illustrated Hamas’s ability to extend the reach of its rocket attacks.
Since Wednesday, when the latest escalation of the conflict began, Iron Dome has knocked 245 rockets out of the sky, the military said on Saturday, while 500 have struck Israel.
The American-financed system is designed to intercept only rockets streaking toward towns and cities and to ignore those likely to strike open ground. But on Sunday a rocket fired from Gaza plowed through the roof of an apartment building in the southern Israeli city of Ashkelon. There were no immediate reports of casualties there.
In Gaza City, the crash of explosions pierced the quiet several times throughout the early morning.
Hamas health officials said the Palestinian death toll rose to 53 by early Sunday afternoon, the latest victim a 52-year-old woman whose house in the eastern part of Gaza City was bombed around lunchtime.
A few hours earlier, a Hamas militant was killed and seven people were wounded in an attack on the Beach Refugee Camp, where Ismail Haniyeh, the Hamas prime minister, has a home. Those killed on Sunday included 3 children aged between one and 5, the health officials said.
In Israel, 3 civilians have died and 63 have been injured. Four soldiers were also wounded on Saturday.
The onslaught continued despite talks in Cairo that Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi said Saturday night he thought could soon result in a cease-fire. Prime Minister Netanyahu said he would consider a comprehensive cease-fire if the launches from Gaza stop.
Saturday’s attack on Mr. Haniyeh’s office, one of several on government installations, came a day after he hosted his Egyptian counterpart in the same building, a sign of Hamas’s new legitimacy in a radically redrawn Arab world.
That stature was underscored Saturday by a visit to Gaza from the Tunisian foreign minister and the rapid convergence in Cairo of two Hamas allies, the prime minister of Turkey and the crown prince of Qatar, for talks with the Egyptian president and the chairman of Hamas on a possible cease-fire.
A delegation of Arab ministers plans to visit Gaza on Tuesday, Reuters reported, while Ban Ki-moon, the United Nations Secretary General, is expected in Cairo on Monday.
But Mark Regev, a spokesman for Mr. Netanyahu, denied reports on Saturday that a truce was imminent.
President Obama said Sunday that he had spoken several times with Mr. Netanyahu in Israel, Mr. Morsi in Egypt and Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey in hopes of finding a way to address Israel’s security concerns without ramping up military operations further.
“We are actively working with all the parties in the region to see if we can end those missiles being fired without further escalation of violence in the region,” he said.
Israel Warns of ‘Expansion’ as Attack Widens to Media Sites
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Israel Warns of ‘Expansion’ as Attack Widens to Media Sites
