Al Jazeera English airs exclusive footage of the deadly Israeli airstrikes which hit Gaza yesterday.

Today, May 18th, five more Palestinians were murdered in Gaza during two more Israeli airstrikes. In retaliation for a homemade rocket being fired into Israel, Israeli helicopter gunships fired on a group, killing one man and injuring several more. In a separate incident, four other men were killed when a base used by the Hamas Party was hit by at least one missile from an F-16 fighter jet. These attacks came after a series of airstrikes the previous day (shown above) which killed four Palestinians and injured four more.

In response to the airstrikes, which Israel says are in response to rocket fire, Hamas has vowed to renew its suicide bombing operations. “I am handling this crisis in order to remove this threat as much as possible,” said PM Olmert. Israel also moved tanks and armored vehicles into the Gaza Strip, which they withdrew from in 2005. A spokesman claims the move is purely “defensive”.

Internal fighting has continued despite a Wednesday ceasefire. Hamas has endured both Israeli airstrikes and Fatah grenade fire, stating that the two are working together. A spokesman for Hamas accused the Fatah-loyal Presidential Guard of taking orders from Israel after a Hamas-dominated Islamic University was fired on. Al Jazeera correspondent Nour Odeh commented, “To reach the point where you can envision your enemy siding with another Palestinian faction against you says a lot about where Palestinian factions are and how low domestic Palestinian politics has reached.”

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Riz Khan talks to Karen AbuZayd, Commissioner-General of United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), regarding the issues facing Palestinian refugees, and the difficulties UNRWA faces as internal Palestinian conflict grows in Gaza. The Palestinian issue is perhaps the largest in the Arab world, as they “haven’t seen any change in over 59 years”.