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EREZ CROSSING, Israel – Israel allowed several hundred Palestinians with foreign passports to flee Gaza on Friday, even as its warplanes bombed a mosque it said was used to store weapons and destroyed homes of more than a dozen Hamas operatives.

AP – Palestinian holders of foreign passports wait on a bus after arriving on the Israeli side of the Erez

The evacuees told of crippling shortages of water, electricity and medicine, echoing a U.N. warning of a deepening humanitarian crisis in the besieged Gaza Strip in the seven-day-old Israeli campaign. The U.N. estimates at least a quarter of the 400 Palestinians killed by Israeli airstrikes on Hamas militants were civilians.

Jawaher Hajji, a 14-year-old U.S. citizen who was allowed to cross into Israel, said her uncle was one of them — killed while trying to pick up some medicine for her cancer-stricken father. She said her father later died of his illness.

"They are supposed to destroy just the Hamas, but people in their homes are dying too," Hajji, who has relatives in Virginia, said at the Erez border crossing between Gaza and Israel.

President George W. Bush on Friday branded the Hamas rocket attacks an "act of terror," while Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice accused Hamas' leaders of holding the people of Gaza hostage.

"The Hamas has used Gaza as a launching pad for rockets against Israeli cities, and has contributed deeply to a very bad daily life for the Palestinian people in Gaza and to a humanitarian situation that we have all been trying to address," she said.

International calls for a cease-fire have been growing, and French President Nicolas Sarkozy is expected in the region next week.

Bush said no peace deal would be acceptable without monitoring to halt the flow of smuggled weapons to terrorist groups.

"The United States is leading diplomatic efforts to achieve a meaningful cease-fire that is fully respected," Bush said Friday in his weekly radio address, released a day early. "Another one-way cease-fire that leads to rocket attacks on Israel is not acceptable. And promises from Hamas will not suffice — there must be monitoring mechanisms in place to help ensure that smuggling of weapons to terrorist groups in Gaza comes to an end."

Israel has targeted Hamas leaders in the past but halted the practice during a six-month truce that expired last month. Most of Hamas' leaders went into hiding at the start of the Israeli offensive on Dec. 27.

Israeli troops in bases in southern Israel are awaiting orders to invade Gaza.

Exiled Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal, speaking in Syria, warned that any ground assault would lead Israel to "a black destiny of dead and wounded."

However, he said Hamas was "ready to cooperate with any effort leading to an end to the Israeli offensive against Gaza, lifting the seige and opening all crossings."

Israel appears to be open to the intense diplomatic efforts by Arab and European leaders, saying it would consider stopping its punishing aerial assaults if international monitors were brought in to track compliance with any truce with Hamas.

Israel began its campaign to try to halt weeks of intensifying Palestinian rocket fire from Gaza. The offensive has dealt a heavy blow to Hamas but has not stopped the rockets, which continue to strike deeper and deeper into Israel. Three Israeli civilians and one soldier have been killed in the rocket attacks.

More than 30 rockets were fired into southern Israel on Friday, slightly injuring four. Sirens warning Israelis to take cover when military radar picks up an incoming rocket have helped reduce casualties in recent days.

Israeli TV showed video of a table set for the traditional Sabbath meal covered with shrapnel and broken glass.

After destroying Hamas' security compounds early in the operation, Israel has turned its attention to the group's leadership. Israeli warplanes on Friday hit about 20 houses believed to belong to Hamas militants and members of other armed groups, Palestinians said.

Israel also bombed a mosque it said was used to store weapons. The mosque was known as a Hamas stronghold and was identified with Nizar Rayan, the Hamas militant leader killed Thursday when Israel dropped a one-ton bomb on his home. Rayan, 49, ranked among Hamas' top five decision-makers. The explosion killed 20 people, including all four of Rayan's wives and 11 of his children.

Israel's military said the bombing of Rayan's house triggered secondary explosions from the weapons stockpile there.

Fear of Israeli attacks led to sparse turnout at Friday's communal prayers at mosques throughout Gaza. Still, thousands attended a memorial service for Rayan, with throngs praying over the rubble of his home and the nearby destroyed mosque.

An imam delivered his sermon over a car loudspeaker as the bodies of Rayan and other family members were covered in green Hamas flags. Explosions from Israeli airstrikes and the sound of warplanes could be heard.

Following the prayers, mourners marched with the bodies, with many people reaching out to touch and kiss them.

"The Palestinian resistance will not forget and will not forgive," said Hamas lawmaker Mushir Masri. "The resistance's response will be very painful."

Israel also destroyed homes of more than a dozen Hamas operatives. Most appeared to be empty, but one man was killed in a strike in the Jebaliya refugee camp in northern Gaza.

Fourteen other Palestinians died Friday — killed in airstrikes or dying of wounds from earlier violence, officials said. Among them were two teenagers as well as three children — two brothers and their cousin — who were playing in southern Gaza, according to Health Ministry official Dr. Moaiya Hassanain.

Maxwell Gaylard, U.N. humanitarian coordinator for the Palestinians Territories, said 2,000 people have been wounded in the past week and a "significant number" of the dead were women and children. "There is a critical emergency right now in the Gaza Strip," he said.

The U.N. World Food Program began distributing bread in Gaza to Palestinian families. It said there had been a drastic deterioration in living conditions, with shortages of food, cooking gas and fuel, as well as frequent power cuts.

Israel denies there is a humanitarian crisis in Gaza and has increased its shipments of goods into Gaza. It says it has confined its attacks to militants while trying to prevent civilian casualties.

The military has called some houses ahead of time to warn inhabitants of an impending attack. In some cases, aircraft also fired sound bombs to warn away civilians before flattening the homes with their missiles, Palestinians and Israeli defense officials said.

Israeli planes also dropped leaflets east of Gaza giving a confidential phone number and e-mail address for people to report locations of rocket squads. Residents appeared to ignore the leaflets.

In all, Israel allowed 270 Palestinians to cross the border from Gaza to flee the fighting. The evacuees all held foreign passports, and were expected to join their families in the U.S., Russia, Turkey, Norway, Belarus, Kazakhstan and elsewhere.

Nashwa Hajji, Jawaher's 13-year-old younger sister, said her family left their home following Israeli warnings, but others refused. "People said, 'We don't want to go. We will die where we are,'" she said.

The Hajji family was notified Thursday by the U.S. consulate that it was being evacuated. After crossing Erez, they and others boarded buses taking them to Amman, Jordan. Hajji said she, her mother and five siblings would fly to Virginia from there.

The State Department said it had assisted 27 U.S. citizens and members of their immediate families to leave Gaza on Friday and make their way to Jordan and stood ready to help others. Department officials said earlier this week they were aware of roughly 30 Americans in Gaza but that there could be others.

Many of the evacuees were foreign-born women married to Palestinians and their children. Spouses who did not hold foreign citizenship were not allowed out.

"I feel happy and sad," said Caroline Katba, 15, A Russian citizen. "Happy, because I am going to Russia, and sad, because my father is left behind."

WASHINGTON – President George W. Bush on Friday branded the Hamas rocket attacks on Israel an "act of terror" and outlined his own condition for a cease-fire in Gaza, saying no peace deal would be acceptable without monitoring to halt the flow of smuggled weapons to terrorist groups.

Bush chose his weekly taped radio address to speak for the first time about one of the bloodiest Mideast clashes in decades. It began a week ago. Israeli warplanes have rained bombs on Gaza, targeting the Palestinian militant group Hamas, which has traumatized southern Israel with intensifying rocket attacks.

"The United States is leading diplomatic efforts to achieve a meaningful cease-fire that is fully respected," Bush said. "Another one-way cease-fire that leads to rocket attacks on Israel is not acceptable. And promises from Hamas will not suffice — there must be monitoring mechanisms in place to help ensure that smuggling of weapons to terrorist groups in Gaza comes to an end."

The White House released Bush's radio address a day early. It airs on Saturday morning.

Despite Bush's account of a U.S. leadership role, with time running out on his presidency, the administration seemed increasingly ready Friday to let the crisis in Gaza shift to President-elect Barack Obama. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice briefed Bush on developments in Gaza, and she continued furious telephone diplomacy to arrange a truce. Yet, she said she had no plans to make an emergency visit to the region.

More than 400 Palestinians and four Israelis have been killed in the latest offensive. The U.N. estimated Friday that a quarter of the Palestinians killed were civilians. In their waning days in power, Bush and Rice have been working the phones with world allies.

Bush offered no criticism of Israel, depicting the country's air assaults as a response to the attacks on its people. The White House will not comment on whether it views the Israeli response as proportionate or not to the scope of rockets attacks on Israel.

"This recent outburst of violence was instigated by Hamas — a Palestinian terrorist group supported by Iran and Syria that calls for Israel's destruction," Bush said.

The president said Hamas ultimately ended the latest cease-fire on Dec. 19 and "soon unleashed a barrage of rockets and mortars that deliberately targeted innocent Israelis — an act of terror that is opposed by the legitimate leader of the Palestinian people, President (Mahmoud) Abbas."

Hamas-run Gaza has been largely isolated from the rest of the world since the Islamic militants won parliamentary elections in 2006. Then Hamas violently seized control of the Gaza Strip in June 2007, expelling forces loyal to the moderate Abbas.

Bush expressed deep concern about the humanitarian suffering of the Palestinian people in Gaza. U.N. officials say Gaza's 1.5 million residents face an alarming situation under constant Israeli bombardment, with hospitals overcrowded and both fuel and food supplies growing scarce.

"By spending its resources on rocket launchers instead of roads and schools, Hamas has demonstrated that it has no intention of serving the Palestinian people," Bush said. "America has helped by providing tens of millions of dollars in humanitarian aid, and this week we contributed an additional $85 million through the United Nations. We have consistently called on all in the region to ensure that assistance reaches those in need."

The White House has cautiously said Israel must be mindful of the toll its military strikes will have on civilians. Here, too, Bush blamed Hamas for hiding within the civilian population. "Regrettably, Palestinian civilians have been killed in recent days," he said.

International calls for a cease-fire have been growing. Bush promised to stay engaged with U.S. partners in the Middle East and Europe and keep Obama updated. Obama is receiving the same intelligence reports on Gaza that Bush is.

Rice has spoken to both Obama and his choice for secretary of state, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, about the situation at least once in the last week. Obama and Clinton have remained mum out of deference to Bush, who still has 18 days in office.

There have been growing calls for Rice to intervene with Israel in person amid rising international concern about the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza. Her decision to stay away will likely disappoint those calling for a more robust U.S. role, particularly as French President Nicolas Sarkozy intends visit the region next week.

In recent days, U.S. officials had said that a Rice trip to the Middle East, as a first stop on a long-planned visit to China next week, was under consideration. But those officials said Friday that Rice would stay in Washington. They spoke on condition of anonymity because an announcement is not expected before the weekend.

CRAWFORD, Texas – The deaths of hundreds of Palestinians in Israel's deadliest-ever air assault on Hamas further complicate President-elect Barack Obama's challenge to achieve a Middle East peace — something that eluded both the Bush and Clinton administrations.

AFP – US President-elect Barack Obama (2ndR) departs a gym after his morning work out, taking time to talk

The Bush administration has blamed the renewed violence on the militant Islamic group Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip, saying it broke a cease-fire by firing rockets and mortars deep into Israeli territory. The Arab world, however, has reacted with rage to the aggressive Israeli counterattacks, which have left at least 290 Palestinians dead and more than 600 wounded.

It's unclear whether Obama will be as supportive of Israel as President George W. Bush has been.

David Axelrod, senior adviser to Obama, chose his words carefully Sunday, saying the president-elect would honor the "important bond" between the United States and Israel.

"He wants to be a constructive force in helping to bring about the peace and security that both the Israelis and the Palestinians want and deserve," Axelrod said on CBS' "Face the Nation." "Obviously, this situation has become even more complicated in the last couple of days and weeks. As Hamas began its shelling, Israel responded. But it's something that he's committed to."

Pressed about how much support Obama will offer Israel, Axelrod said: "He's going to work closely with the Israelis. They're a great ally of ours, the most important ally in the region. ... But he will do so in a way that will promote the cause of peace, and work closely with the Israelis and the Palestinians on that — toward that objective."

Israel had been carrying out its attack exclusively from the air, but the Israeli Cabinet has authorized the military to call up 6,500 reserve soldiers for a possible ground invasion.

"I'm not sure it's a good idea," Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, said Sunday on ABC's "This Week." "I mean, Israel certainly has the right to self-defense, of course. Hamas has not recognized Israel's right to exist. ... But I'm hopeful that as this transition comes, as we look to January, that strong presidential leadership can make a difference here."

Jon Alterman, head of the Middle East program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, speculated that Israeli leaders synchronized their retaliatory attacks to political calendars in both Israel and the U.S. More moderate politicians running in the Feb. 10 national election needed to appear strong against Hamas, and it was perhaps better to strike before Bush left office on Jan. 20 because they weren't as sure what Obama's reaction would be.

"I think Obama will be supportive of Israel, but will bring a little more skepticism to it," Alterman said. "I think Obama will start from premise that Israel is an ally, but that we have to look at this fresh."

The White House was mum about the situation in Gaza on Sunday after speaking out strongly on Saturday. The Bush administration condemned the repeated rocket and mortar attacks against Israel and said it held Hamas responsible for breaking a cease-fire. The U.S. implored Israel to avoid civilian casualties and asked all concerned to address the urgent humanitarian needs of innocent people in Gaza.

Bush, who is staying at his Texas ranch, spoke on the phone with national security adviser Stephen Hadley to receive an update on the situation and was being kept abreast of developments throughout the day, said Gordon Johndroe, a presidential spokesman. He said Bush would receive an intelligence briefing via a secured video hookup at the ranch early Monday morning and would be briefed then on any overnight developments.

According to an aide on Obama's transition team, the president-elect, who is in Hawaii, continues to closely monitor global events, including the situation in Gaza. He had an intelligence briefing Sunday and plans to talk with his incoming national security adviser, Gen. James Jones, and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, his nominee for secretary of state.

The aide said Obama appreciates the information the Bush administration is sharing with him. The aide requested anonymity because the Obama team is refraining from comment, saying the U.S. has only one president at a time.

When Hamas took control of Gaza in June 2007, it fractured governance of the Palestinian territory. The other part, the West Bank, is controlled by moderate Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. The renewed violence increases the volatility of an already unstable area.

"It undoubtedly will have a very severe impact on wherever the next administration would like to go," Ed Abington, a former American diplomat who advises Abbas, said in an interview. "You can't kill almost 300 Palestinians and wound 600 to 700 and not have repercussions in the region."

"I don't quite know where the Israelis want to end up," he added, saying that trying to bomb Hamas into submission only rekindles radicalization. Abington said Israel's retaliatory attacks weaken, not strengthen, the stature of Abbas, who is backed by the West.

Alterman said, however, that if Hamas is weakened by the bombings in Gaza, Abbas' position could be emboldened. "It's possible to imagine that he could emerge as some sort of broker who saves Gaza from an Israeli onslaught," Alterman said.