Debate raged in Israel today over the wisdom of killing one of its most bitter enemies at the cost of 14 Palestinian lives and international condemnation of the devastating Gaza air raid.
A day after the killing of Salah Shehada, commander of the military wing of the Islamic group Hamas, it emerged that the F-16 warplane that attacked his house used a powerful one-tonne precision "smart bomb" to ensure he could not survive.
Nine Palestinian children, including a two-month-old baby, were among the 14 others killed in the attack. The explosion, which also wounded at least 145 Palestinians, levelled several houses around the militant's home in a densely populated neighbourhood of Gaza City.
"We shall investigate very clearly what went wrong and draw all the conclusions," Israeli Foreign Minister Mr Shimon Peres told the BBC, calling Shehada a "sort of a local (Osama) bin Laden" responsible for the deaths of hundreds.
Despite escalating tensions, Mr Peres said Israel intended to hold more talks with Palestinian officials on easing hardships of 700,000 Palestinians under curfew since Israel reoccupied seven West Bank cities last month following suicide attacks. He did not give a date for the new talks.
But Israeli President Mr Moshe Katsav said earlier that the operation had been a "mishap", according to army radio reports.
"The political leadership must take responsibility for this mishap," the president said, deploring the deaths of "innocent civilians". But Mr Katsav stressed there was "no reason to hang anybody for what happened".
Meanwhile Mr Haim Ramon, a member of Mr Peres's Labour Party and chairman of parliament's foreign affairs and defence committee, told Israel Radio the buck stopped with the government.
"Ultimately it was the military's mistake, but it does not send an F-16 to a populated area without political authorisation," he said.
The strike, which Palestinians called a massacre, drew rare criticism from Washington which joined the European Union, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan and a slew of countries around the world in condemning the strike.
Israeli Prime Minister Mr Ariel Sharon called the strike a "great success" but said he regretted the death of civilians.
In an interview due to be aired this evening, Mr Sharon said Israel was prepared to take "painful compromises" to achieve peace with the Palestinians. But he did not elaborate and said his country would not compromise over the security of its people under any circumstances.
Mr Sharon was speaking to Germany's ARD television, according to a transcript of the interview taped in Jerusalem on Monday with German Jewish leader Michel Friedman.
AFP and