Warplanes fired two missiles into the building, targeting foreign minister Mahmoud Al Zahar's offices and causing serious damage to the recently renovated five-storey building, the neighboring finance ministry, and 15 other houses.
The attack came just hours before Israel bombed Beirut's international airport and killed at least 40 Lebanese, opening a new front in the Middle East crisis after Hizbullah captured another two soldiers on its northern border.
Israel confirmed the attack on the offices of Zahar, who an army spokeswoman branded "one of the most extreme leaders of the Hamas terror organization" directly responsible for planning "terrorist attacks."
The foreign minister condemned the attack and the killing of civilians in Israeli airstrikes as the cabinet gathered after the bombing.
The F-16 strike in the dead of night was part of Israel's offensive to release a teenage soldier and end rocket attacks, and follows past bombings of the Gaza offices of premier Ismail Haniya and interior minister Siad Siam.
It was ordered just one day after 23 Palestinians, including seven children from the same family, were killed in a series of Israeli airstrikes on the deadliest day in the Gaza Strip since the assault began three weeks ago.
Ten children, including babies aged four and six months old, who lived in nearby homes badly damaged in the powerful blast, were wounded in the foreign ministry attack, witnesses and doctors at Gaza City's Shifa Hospital said.
Rescue workers battled to control the fire that raged after the airstrike.
Seventy-five Palestinians have now been killed since Israel stepped up its ground offensive just over a week ago, moving troops into areas evacuated less than 10 months ago as part of an historic pullout from Gaza after 38 years.
Zahar is one of the government's most prominent ministers and a long-time Hamas leader who has become the face abroad of the Palestinian administration, desperately trying to drum up funds abroad for his Western-boycotted cabinet.
"Mahmoud Al Zahar ... is responsible for both planning and directing terrorist attacks," Israeli army spokeswoman Captain Noa Meir said. "These offices serve one of the most extreme leaders of the Hamas terror organization."
"We condemn all Israeli aggressions, including those against the foreign ministry and Palestinian civilians," hit back Zahar.
What has become the worst Israeli-Palestinian crisis in months was sparked by the June 25 abduction of Corporal Gilad Shalit on the Gaza border.
The armed wing of Hamas, together with two other Palestinian militant groups claimed responsibility for his capture, and like Hizbullah, is demanding the release of prisoners in exchange for their hostage.
Hamas' armed Ezzedine Al Qassam Brigades on Wednesday vowed a "strong and painful" response after a deadly airstrike on the home of a Hamas political leader, in which the faction's top commander was reportedly wounded.
Mohammed Deif, the leader of Ezzedine Al Qassam Brigades who is believed to be the mastermind behind a wave of suicide bombings in the 1990s that killed dozens of Israelis, was said to be in a serious condition.
But Zahar repeated denials from Hamas' armed wing that Deif had been in the building at the time of the airstrike, in which nine members of the same family were killed.
"There were only civilians in this house and all the martyrs were civilians," he added.
Israeli ground troops are still based inside the Gaza Strip, and artillery routinely battered rocket-launching sites in the north and south.
Israel has flatly refused to negotiate with Hamas or free Palestinian prisoners in exchange for Shalit, vowing that the assault will continue "in places, in time, in measures" at its convenience.
Aid groups have expressed concern about the difficulties of providing assistance to 1.4 million people living in Gaza following months of financial crisis and the suspension of direct Western aid to the Hamas-led government.
© 2006 Agence France-Presse
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