Israeli military operation
goes on, 6 Palestinians killed
GAZA/RAMALLAH, July 7 (Xinhua) -- Israeli air and ground
operations against the Palestinians continued on Friday, and six Palestinians
were killed and 10 injured, medics and witnesses said.
Two militants were killed and three injured Friday
afternoon in a fresh Israeli air strike on the northern town of Beit Lahya. On
Friday morning, another two militants were killed and two injured in two
separate air strikes on Beit Lahya and Jabalya in northern Gaza Strip, security
sources said.
Medics said that a fifth Palestinian who was
critically wounded in an air raid Thursday night died in hospital on Friday of
his wounds.
Meanwhile, an Israeli army force stormed on Friday
morning a Palestinian refugee camp in the northern West Bank town of Nablus,
killing a Palestinian militant, member of the al-Aqsa Brigades, the Fatah's
armed wing.
Khaled Radi, spokesman of the Palestinian Ministry of
Health, said that the death toll of Palestinians killed by the Israeli army
since Thursday predawn reached 28, adding that 92 people were also injured, many
of them women and children.
On Thursday predawn, the Israeli army expanded its
"Summer Rains" operation against the Gaza Strip and sent more tanks and armored
personnel carriers into former Jewish settlements in northern Gaza Strip.
Israeli army officials said that the aim of the
operation was to free an abducted Israeli soldier in the Gaza Strip and prevent
Palestinian rocket firing. Enditem
Related:
Palestinian killed by Israeli fire in N.
Gaza
GAZA, July 7 (Xinhua) -- A Palestinian was killed by
Israeli tank fire in northern Gaza Strip on Friday, Palestinian witnesses and
medics said.
Witnesses said that a Palestinian was killed by
Israeli tank fire near the northern town of Beit Lahya, where Israel carried out
deadly attacks on Thursday, leaving more than a dozen people dead.
Earlier in the day, Israel renewed air raids against
Palestinian gunmen in northern Gaza Strip, killing one militant from the ruling
Hamas movement, medics said, adding that two others were wounded in the raids.
The Friday attacks came after a bloody day of clashes
between Israeli troops and Palestinian gunmen in the Gaza Strip that left an
Israeli soldier and 19 Palestinians dead including several civilians.
The Israeli army has expanded a ground operation in
the strip to rescue an Israeli soldier abducted by Palestinian militants on June
25 and stop Palestinian rocket firing.
The Israeli security cabinet authorized the army on
Wednesday to set up a "security zone" in northern Gaza Strip to prevent rocket
fire after a homemade rocket hit the center of Israel's coastal city of Ashkelon
for the first time on Tuesday evening. It was the furthest north in Israel that
a rocket fired by Palestinian militants from the strip has reached. Enditem
40 Palestinian
militants killed since start of Gaza operation: Israel
A Palestinian man injured in an Israeli air attack is
sent to a nearby hospital in northern Gaza Strip, July 7, 2006.
Battles between Israeli troops and Palestinian militants in the northern
Gaza Strip Thursday have killed at least one Israeli soldier and 15
Palestinians, according to sources from the Israel Defense Forces and a
Palestinian hospital medics. (Xinhua/AFP
Photo) |
JERUSALEM, July 7 (Xinhua) -- 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, Israel Radio reported.
"The terrorists have paid a heavy price so far,"
Halutz was quoted as saying.
But he underscored that Israel's blow to Palestinian
militant cells in Gaza would not halt rocket attacks against Israel totally.
"It doesn't mean there won't be rocket fire if we
leave tomorrow or the day after", he said, without disclosing when Israel
planned to conclude the northern Gaza actions.
An Israeli soldier and about 20 Palestinians
including civilians were killed on Thursday, the bloodiest single day in Gaza
since Israel withdrew forces and settlers from it last summer after 38 years of
occupation.
The Israeli army has expanded the operation in Gaza by entering into northern Gaza on Thursday in large numbers aimed to rescue an Israeli soldier abducted by Gazan militants on June 25 and stop the Palestinian rocket firing. Enditem
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