THE WORLD - Rocket strikes next to Israeli day-care center

None of the 15 children at the center was injured. But frantic parents, angry over the government's inability to protect Sderot from near-daily rocket fire, pulled the town's 2,500 schoolchildren out of classes and vowed to keep them home until they got fortified classrooms or were transferred.

Signaling an escalation of the conflict, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said the army had been instructed to "destroy every rocket launcher and to strike all those involved in the fire."

"We will not limit ourselves," he said at a news conference in Jerusalem.

Israel carries out frequent ground and air attacks against Gaza-based militants who have launched thousands of crude Kassam rockets across the border since 2001. But it has been unable to stop the rockets, which have killed at least 12 Israelis in the last six years, or protect the 22,000 people of Sderot, the only sizable Israeli community within the weapon's 6-mile range.

The army said seven rockets, some fired from as close as a mile away, fell in or near Sderot on Monday. The militant group Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the barrage, calling it "a gift to the Israelis for the new school year" and retaliation for "crimes against Palestinian children."

Three Palestinian cousins, ages 10 to 12, were killed Wednesday in an airstrike on one of Islamic Jihad's rocket launch sites near the border. The Israeli army initially said it fired at three figures thought to be retrieving the launcher and realized too late that they were children. After an inquiry, the army acknowledged that the cousins had been playing tag.

By the weekend, the army said it had identified the Islamic Jihad cell responsible for recent rocket fire. But a missile launched from an Israeli air force plane Sunday missed the vehicle in which the militants were traveling.

Gaza is ruled by Hamas, an Islamic militant movement that refuses to renounce violence against Israel. It has done little to stop Islamic Jihad and other groups from firing rockets.

Sunday was the first day of Israel's academic year. Anticipating that Sderot would be targeted, the army dispatched more than 200 soldiers to escort students between home and school and to instruct them on emergency procedures.