MIDDLE EAST: Six Palestinians and an Israeli soldier killed in fierce clashes in northern Gaza

Israeli forces backed by tanks killed seven Palestinians including five militants on Wednesday (November 1) while a soldier was also killed in one of the heaviest Israeli raids into the Gaza Strip in months. Israeli soldiers entered northern Gaza before dawn and fighting quickly erupted around the town of Beit Hanoun, followed by air strikes and tank shelling, witnesses said. They said the army, with air support, had surrounded the town. In a video handed to Reuters several Palestinian gunman and civilians were seen shot and wounded by Israeli soldiers, witnesses reported. The witnesses said that clashes erupted between two gunmen and Israeli soldiers in the northern town. During the fire exchange one gunman was hit and evacuated by a local ambulance while his fellow militant fled the scene. Their weapons were left at the site. As a group of Palestinians reached for the weapons, the soldiers continued to shoot, wounding two men while they were fleeing the gunbattle, the witnesses added. The Israeli military said there was "ground action" in northern Gaza which is directed against rocket launching infrastructure and gunmen. The operation was one of the biggest since Israel launched an offensive in Gaza to press for the release of a soldier captured by Palestinian gunmen on June 25 in a cross-border raid and to halt militant rocket fire into the Jewish state. Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas said the escalation was a result of the inclusion of Israel's far right Minister Avigdor Lieberman to the government earlier this week. "We see this massacre as a first fruit of the inclusion of Lieberman to the Israeli government which lays down the foundation for a future aggressive policy against our Palestinian people," said Haniyeh. Haniyeh said he hoped the attacks, which he branded a "massacre", would not derail Egyptian-brokered talks trying to arrange a swap of Palestinian prisoners in Israel for the release of the captive soldier. Moderate Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said Israel was waging "all-out war", and called the operation "despicable". "This explicitly shows that those who want peace would not carry out such actions. If the issue is the (captive) soldier then the soldier should be released, in exchange there are more than 10,000 prisoners that should be freed. This issue (captive soldier) should not be exploited as a pretext to murder and (to wage) an all-out war," Abbas told reporters from the West Bank city of Ramallah. Israeli Defence Minister Amir Peretz toured an army base on the fringe of the Gaza Strip and reiterated Israel's right to defend itself. "Last night we launched an operation which has a specific target. We intend to do whatever it takes to reduce and hit the units of Qassam (rocket) launchers", Peretz told reporters during his tour. But he also noted that the possible release of Corporal Gilad Shalit may bring about a breakthrough in long-stalled peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians. Israel Radio said new cabinet minister Avigdor Lieberman recommended the army adopt what the radio called the "Russian model in Chechnya", conjuring up images of destruction during Russian operations in the volatile Russian region. Lieberman, who joined the cabinet this week as minister of strategic affairs, said the report was inaccurate. In a statement, he condemned "distorted and tendentious leaks" from the security cabinet meeting. A delegation from the governing Hamas Islamist movement has been holding negotiations with Egyptian officials in Cairo this week on a possible deal. In Jerusalem, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's security cabinet agreed to continue current Gaza operations and step up pressure on Hamas, a government statement said. It did not elaborate. Israel withdrew its army and Jewish settlers from Gaza last year after a 38-year occupation, but tension began rising along the frontier when Hamas took power after winning January elections. The movement formally seeks to destroy Israel. Israeli air strikes around Beit Hanoun killed a Palestinian policeman and two gunmen, including one from Hamas, Palestinian security sources said. Three other Hamas gunmen were killed by tank fire and in clashes, witnesses said. Hospital officials said a civilian was killed in his house by Israeli gunfire. Throughout the day Israeli Tanks, backed by armoured vehicles and bulldozers, were seen driving through the streets of Beit Hanoun while a drone was firing from above. Some 45 Palestinians were wounded, including at least two dozen hurt in ground clashes, hospital officials said. The Israeli soldier was killed in a gun battle, the army said. The Hamas armed wing said it killed the soldier and wounded several others. The body of the soldier was transferred to Nizmit, on the Israeli side of the border, from which it was taken to the morgue. Residents said the raid in Beit Hanoun appeared to be the biggest there since Israel's withdrawal from Gaza last year. Militants vowed revenge, and later fired six homemade rockets at the Israeli border town of Sderot from northern Gaza despite the latest Israeli operation. Israeli medical officials said two rockets hit the town, lightly wounding one person. The first hit a factory whereas the second landed in a park. "We assure that any Zionist invasion into the Gaza Strip will never be (an easy) trip, and it is not easy for them to invade the Gaza Strip as the Zionist enemy claims. They know this very well," said Abu Ubaida, leader of Izz-al-Din al-Qassam, the Hamas armed wing, at a news conference in Gaza. He warned of more rocket attacks and said residents should leave Sderot. Israeli government spokeswoman Miri Eisin said that the only thing the Palestinians have exported from the Gaza Strip since September 2005 when Israel left completely have been Qassam rockets. Some 280 Palestinians have been killed in the four-month-old Israeli offensive, about half of them civilians. Three Israeli soldiers have been killed.

ITN Source | November 1, 2006

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