Some 200 people demonstrated in Tel Aviv on Wednesday, saying the Israeli government had 'blood on its hands' after the killing of 18 Palestinians, mostly women and children, by shell fire in Gaza.
"This government has blood on its hands," read a sign carried by some of the protestors in front of the Israeli defence ministry following the attack in Gaza's northern town of Beit Hanun.
The demonstrators called for "dialogue in place of war".
Some of them called for the resignation of Defence Minister Amir Peretz, a former Peace Now activist who has presided over a bloody four-month operation against militants in Gaza that has left more than 300 Palestinians dead.
Meanwhile B'Tselem, a prominent rights group in the Jewish state, called for a criminal investigation, saying Wednesday's attack -- in which five women and eight children were among the dead -- raised "grave concern that the action constitutes a war crime."
"Artillery fire, which is inherently inaccurate, near a densely-populated residential area makes civilian casualties very likely," it said in a statement.
"Therefore, the military's contention that they did not mean to kill civilians in Beit Hanun is disingenuous lip service," it said.
The army said it fired artillery shells on an area used by militants to launch rockets into Israel, with the shells apparently missing their target. Peretz ordered an immediate investigation.