Thousands Mourn Slain Wife, Baby of Hamas Commander

Several thousand mourners on Wednesday joined the funeral procession for the wife and baby son of Hamas's military commander Mohammed Deif, angrily demanding revenge against Israel.

Firing Kalashnikovs into the air, they carried the bodies of 27-year-old Widad and her seven-month-old son Ali, who were among at least four people killed in a deadly air strike on Gaza City late on Tuesday.

The two bodies were wrapped in green Hamas flags as they were carried from the mosque to the cemetery in Jabaliya refugee camp. Mourners also carried the flag-wrapped bodies of two men killed in an air strike Wednesday on a motorcycle, both presumed Hamas militants.

"Revenge, revenge, revenge," shouted the crowd as they walked towards the cemetery waving Hamas flags and denouncing the killing of the second wife and infant son of Deif, head of the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades.

"We were shocked when we heard that Mohammed Deif's wife had been killed. We ask Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades to avenge this killing, this massacre," said a 22-year-old mourner who gave his name as Mohammed.

"I'm like all the other people in the Gaza Strip. I am no different from the others who have lost children. This is like a tsunami," said Widad's angry father, Mustafa Harb Asfura, 56.

When his university-educated daughter married Deif seven years ago, her father feared it was a death sentence.

"My daughter knew she would die a martyr when she decided to marry Mohammed Deif. Every moment since then I've been expecting to hear that she has died," he said.

Grief-stricken, Asfura carried his tiny grandson from the family's small home in Jabaliya for prayers at the mosque, his body wrapped in a white sheet exposing his white face with bruising around the eyes.

Male relatives carried Widad's body, wrapped in a green Hamas flag and white sheet, on their shoulders.

Asfura said he had only seen his son-in-law once, when the couple married.

After that, he didn't even know where his daughter was living, such is the secrecy that surrounds Deif in his determination to avoid detection by Israel.

Widad and Deif had two daughters and a son together. She also had two sons from a first marriage, the family said.

It was not clear where the couple's two girls were when the strike happened.

Hundreds of people crowded into the mosque for the funeral prayers but there was no sign of any Hamas officials.

Addressing the mourners, a young man passed on the condolences of the Qassam Brigades and prayers were read for two other men, who died earlier on Wednesday when a rocket hit their motorcycle in the northern town of Beit Lahiya.

A small group of women also entered the mosque to attend the prayers. Wearing black abayas, they stayed in a separate room, sobbing in grief.

Hamas later said on Wednesday Deif was alive and still calling the shots in the ongoing war with Israel in and around Gaza.

"The head of the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades Abu Khaled is still alive and leading the military operation," a source close to the Islamist movement told AFP, using Deif's nom-de-guerre.

Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri also issued a statement, saying Israelis would not be safe until Deif decided so.

"The occupation will pay for its crimes against Palestinian civilians and those living around the Gaza border will not return home until Mohammed Deif decides so," he said.

Earlier, Israel's Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman called for military action to topple Hamas, saying the Islamist movement was clearly dictating the pace of the confrontation.

"This policy of 'quiet for quiet' effectively means that Hamas is the initiator and the one deciding when, where and how to shoot at Israeli citizens," he wrote on his Facebook page.

"Hamas is controlling the height of the flames and choses when to disturb the rhythm of life for people in Israel," he said, indicating the rocket fire from Gaza was unlikely to stop.

"When we speak seriously about Israelis' security we must understand that there is no other option other than decisive action with one meaning - toppling Hamas."

Lieberman is one of the most hardline members of Israel's inner security cabinet, which was meeting on Wednesday afternoon to discuss the situation, media reports said.