the beach deaths, Major General Meir Kalifi, reported that the security establishment had received information that Ilham Ghalia said that “Daddy touched something and then there was an explosion”. The IDF viewed her alleged statement as supporting its contention that an IDF shell was not the cause of the deaths. The next day Haaretz reported that the information was of unclear reliability and unsubstantiated. The IDF shelved the claim. Precursor events At the time of the beach explosion, the February 2005 ceasefire agreement between Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was still in effect, notwithstanding various violations by both sides. On June 7, 2005, Two Palestinian workers, Salah Ayash Imran, 57, Muhammed Mahmoud Jaroun, and a foreign worker Bi Shude, 46, were killed, and five other workers were wounded, when a Qassam rocket hit a packing shed in Ganei Tal in Israel. The Islamic Jihad took responsibility for the attack. On June 8 Israel resumed its policy of the extrajudicial killing of key Hamas leaders, with the IDF assassination of Jamal Abu Samhadana. The policy of targeted killings had ceased with the February 2005 Israeli–PA ceasefire agreement, which Hamas had also pledged to observe. Samhadana had been appointed the Palestinian Interior and National Security Ministry of the PNA's new Hamas-led government on 20 April 2006, a position similar to the ministry's director-general. The Israeli military said Samhadana and the other targeted militants were planning an attack on Israel. In response to Samhadana's assassination, Palestinians in the Gaza Strip fired two rockets into Israel hours after his death, hitting a building in the southern town of Sderot, but causing no casualties. On June 9, Israel responded to the rocket fire with a bombardment of launching sites on the beach where the fatalities occurred. Victims On the afternoon of 9 June 2006, seven members of the Ghaliya (Ghalya) family—Ali (Isa), 49; Raisa (Ra’issa), 36; Alia, 24; Ilham, 15; Sabrin, 7; Hanadi, 2; and Haytham (Haitham), 8 months—were killed by a blast on the Sudaniya beach near to Beit Lahia in northern Gaza. Along with 12 (7)-year old Huda, survivors included her mother, Hamdia, and an elder sister, Elham. Three of the wounded sisters and a brother received treatment in an Israeli hospital. Ayham Ghaliya, 21 years old, and Ralia Niham, who was seriously injured in the blast, were treated at the Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center in