MIDDLE EAST: Israeli forces kill Militant commander Fadi Khafisha in Nablus while Israeli army pulls out of Shijaiya

In the West Bank city of Nablus, Israeli soldiers on Thursday (August 31) shot dead Fadi Khafisha of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, part of President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah group, Palestinian security sources said. Israeli sources said the Palestinian gunmen fired first and that another senior militant was among five people wounded in the exchange of fire. Thousands of Palestinian residents of Nablus took to the streets in a funeral procession and members of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades vowed revenge as they showed what they said were uniforms belonging to Israeli soldiers wounded in battles that took place earlier on Thursday. "The martyrdom of our brother Fadi is a big loss for us. We will strike back at the Zionists in the manner that we, and Fadi, have always done. We will hit them in their existence (inside Israel). We did not stop our resistance. We will attack the very existence of the Jews. We promise you, and you know the al-Aqsa Martyr Brigades Group of Fares El-Leyl, we promise that the entrance of the Israeli army into this pure city will not go unpunished, through corpses of Israelis. We will hit them in any position that they take up in this area." a masked militant from Al Aqsa Brigades said. Meanwhile Israeli forces pulled out of Shijaiya early on Thursday (August 31) after a six-day raid as part of an ongoing offensive in the territory, Palestinian residents said. The IDF did not comment on the pullout from Shijaiya. IDF soldiers killed four gunmen and four civilians in Shijaiya on Wednesday (August 30). Residents of the neighbourhood awoke to piles of dirt and sand and tracks leftover from tanks that operated in the area. On Wednesday, the army said the raid into the neighbourhood, a stronghold of Islamist militants, uncovered a 150-metre (409 ft) tunnel being dug towards a border crossing. It believed the tunnel would have been used to carry out an attack. Hundreds of Palestinians took part in the funeral of a man killed in Gaza on Wednesday (August 30). Palestinians at the funeral chanted for revenge as they carried the dead body during the funeral procession at the Gaza city neighbourhood. Israel has killed more than 200 Palestinians, about half of them civilians, during the offensive in Gaza, which was initially launched to try to free a soldier abducted on June 25 by Palestinian militants. Israel had pulled troops and settlers out of Gaza last year after 38 years of occupation.

ITN Source | August 31, 2006

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