Bridge attacked.

Vital Perspective is live-blogging.

John Little at Blogs of War also has live coverage.

Israpundit reports another alleged kidnapping.

Jerusalem Post has breaking news coverage:

IAF aircraft blew up a bridge in the northern Gaza Strip shortly before midnight on Tuesday. The army said that the operation was intended to keep Hamas from taking kidnapped soldier Cpl. Gilad Shalit out of the Gaza Strip.

In addition, IDF tanks were stationed around Gaza, and were awaiting orders to begin a ground incursion into the strip. However, the army contradicted an Israel Radio report that the tanks had actually begun moving into the Strip.

Earlier, Defense Minister Amir Peretz said that “the clock is running out, and Israel is poised and ready for a military operation in the Gaza Strip.”

Earlier, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert had urged the need to “be focused on bringing home [kidnapped IDF soldier] Gilad Shalit. “We are ready for a long and assertive operation. We will fight terror and we won’t negotiate with the kidnappers,” Olmert told the Knesset…

…A senior IDF intelligence officer told the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee that Shalit was being held in the southern Gaza Strip.

He said that the soldier was in the hands of the military wing of Hamas, that was receiving orders from Hamas leader in exile Khaled Mashaal.

The intelligence officer also said that Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Ismail Haniya did not know of Shalit’s exact location but that he was acquainted with the people who kidnapped him. He added that Haniyeh and PA Foreign Minister Mahmoud a-Zahar were acting to solve the situation and that the IDF was operating in order to prevent the soldier from being moved out of Gaza and into Sinai.

Kit Jarrell: Good on Olmert.

Sobek Pundit has more updates.

Earlier today:

The kidnapping of Gilad Shalit

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