PM: Killing PRC leadership only first response to attacks

          Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu visited injured soldiers at Soroka University Medical Center in Beersheba Friday, where he said that the killing of the PRC leadership in Gaza was only Israel's first response to the terror attack that killed eight people near Eilat on Thursday, a PMO spokesman said. "Killing the leaders of the terrorist organization responsible for yesterday's attacks was just our initial response," Netanyahu said during the visit. "We have a policy of making anyone who attacks us pay dearly for it," he added. "We are implementing this policy in the field." On Thursday, Netanyahu said, “We all witnessed today an attempt to escalate the terrorist war against Israel by launching of attacks from the Sinai. If there is someone who thinks that the State of Israel will let this pass, he is mistaken.” He continued: “I have set out a principle – when the citizens of Israel are attacked, we respond immediately and with strength. That principle was implemented today. Those who gave the order to murder our citizens, while hiding in Gaza, are no longer among the living.” Netanyahu commended the IDF and security services for their swift retaliation against the senior terrorist officials in Gaza, thereby preventing an even greater tragedy. “If the terrorist organizations believe that they can attack our citizens and get away with it, they will soon learn how wrong they are. We will exact a price, a very heavy price,” he said. On Thursday evening the IAF bombed the southern Gaza Strip, killing the leadership of the PRC, who Israeli officials said had orchestrated the attacks. The PRC members killed in the retaliatory IAF air strike included the head of the terror group Kamal Nirab, who the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) said had personally directed and planned the attack. Another man killed in the strike was identified as Amas Hamed, commander of the PRC’s military wing and a resident of Rafah. The Shin Bet said that Hamed was involved in the abduction of IDF soldier Gilad Schalit in June 2006 and oversaw numerous attacks against Israel including suicide bombings and rocket attacks. Two other known PRC terrorists, including one who was also involved in Schalit’s abduction, were also killed in the air strike. (23,50)