Four children, aged one to five, their mother and a fighter were killed in Israeli operations in Gaza Monday as Palestinian factions prepared for talks in Egypt on a possible truce. Four siblings – aged one, three, four and five – were killed when a tank shell hit their home in the north Gaza town of Beit Hanun, and their mother died later of her wounds, doctors at the Kamal Radwan hospital said. “I left the house just moments before to look for one of my children. I heard the sound of the explosion, and when I returned to the house I found my wife and my children,” said 70-year-old father Ahmed Abu Maateq. “They had been eating breakfast and my wife had been holding our youngest child in her hands,” he said as he looked down at the blood, flesh and spilled milk splashed across the wreckage. His wife and six children were in the courtyard in their pyjamas when the missile slammed into the front door of the house, he said. Hamas, meanwhile, lashed out at Israel, saying the strike undermined talks in Egypt aimed at securing a ceasefire in Gaza. Senior Hamas leader Ismail Haniya said in a statement that the “massacre” was part of Israel's “constant attempts to destroy any regional or international effort to lift the siege and end the violence.” The latest violence came as Palestinian factions prepared to hold talks in Cairo to discuss a possible ceasefire with Israel after the Hamas movement which rules the Gaza Strip held similar talks in the Egyptian capital. The Popular Resistance Committees (PRC) and the leftist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP) have said they will send representatives to Cairo.
