Special report: Israel launches Gaza assault

    TEHRAN, July 7 (Xinhua) -- Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Friday denounced the ongoing Israeli offensives against the Gaza Strip, saying that such actions could cause an "explosion" in the Islamic world.

    Meanwhile, top cleric Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati on Friday expressed his indignation on Israeli strikes against Palestinians, saying that Israel was exploiting international public attention on the World Cup to commit "despicable behaviors" in the Gaza Strip.

    "When people were focusing their attentions to the World Cup, they are doing despicable behaviors to Palestinians," he said in his Friday prayers sermon to worshipers on Tehran University campus.

    Jannati is the head of the powerful Guardian Council, a constitutional intercessory organ between the government and the Majlis (parliament).

    Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff Dan Halutz said on Friday that some 40 Palestinian militants had been killed since the army started a major ground operation in the Gaza Strip on June 28.The Israeli army has expanded its ground operation in the strip to rescue an Israeli soldier abducted by Palestinian militants on June 25 and stop Palestinian rocket firing. Enditem