Israeli air strike kills three gunmen in Gaza

An Israeli air strike killed three Palestinian fighters in the Gaza Strip on Thursday, said medical workers in the Hamas-controlled coastal territory, and another bulldozer driver was killed after he rammed his vehicle into an Israeli police car and empty bus in Jerusalem.

"A bulldozer hit an empty bus and a police van" near the Malcha shopping mall, said a statement from the Magen David Adom medical rescue service in a statement.

"Two people are lightly injured at the site and the bulldozer driver has been shot and killed," it said.

The driver of the vehicle -- whose identity was not immediately known -- was shot dead by a passing taxi driver and a police officer who was inside the van.

"I shot the driver and a police officer who was in the van also shot him and killed him," taxi driver Oz Nahatabi told public radio.

It marks the third such incident in nine months in the Holy City.

On July 2, a Palestinian killed three Israelis and wounded 45 more as he rammed a bulldozer into buses and cars in downtown Jerusalem before being shot dead.

Three weeks later 16 people were wounded in a similar incident, with the attacker also killed.

Earlier in Gaza, medical workers said two fighters were killed at the scene of the air strike near the Israel-Gaza border and a third died of his wounds later in hospital. A fourth was also injured.

An Israeli army spokesman said the air strike targeted a group of gunmen who had fired an anti-tank missile towards a military patrol on the Israeli side of the border.

Shortly after the attack, a rocket fired from the Gaza Strip landed in southern Israel, the army said. No injuries or damage were reported.

On Wednesday, Israeli warplanes killed an Islamic Jihad field commander in the enclave and the group vowed to avenge his death.

In late December, Israel launched a 22-day offensive in the Gaza Strip that was designed to punish fighters for mounting cross-border rocket and mortar attacks on the Jewish state. The offensive left more than 1,330 Palestinians dead and 5,000 wounded. Thirteen Israelis were also killed during the war, which also left more than 5,000 houses destroyed in Gaza.

While Egypt has been trying to consolidate a Jan. 18 truce, gunmen have carried out sporadic attacks and Israel has usually responded with air strikes on suspected smuggling tunnels on the Gaza-Egypt border.