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08-06-02, 08:45 AM
Israeli helicopter attack hammers Gaza City targets
BY SUDARSAN RAGHAVAN
Herald World Staff
JERUSALEM - Israeli helicopters pummeled Palestinian targets in Gaza City on Monday night, retaliating for a wave of attacks that killed 14 Israelis and wounded scores over a 24-hour period.
After circling the city, one of the helicopters fired several missiles at a metalworks factory near the center of Gaza City, injuring five people, including a teenager, said witnesses and hospital workers. People ran for cover and ambulances rushed to treat the wounded. Women were screaming and men ordered their children to get inside their homes.
The 20-minute assault temporarily knocked out the electricity grid, plunging portions of the city into darkness.
Israel said the factory was a bomb-making workshop and that the airstrikes were the latest attempt to knock out the ''terrorist infrastructure'' of the militant Islamic group Hamas.
Hamas, which is based in Gaza, has claimed responsibility for two bombings in the past week, one at Jerusalem's Hebrew University, which killed seven people, including five Americans, and the suicide bombing of a bus Sunday, which killed nine people in northern Galilee.
The bus bombing was the first of a wave of Palestinian attacks over the weekend, including a dramatic shootout near Jerusalem's Damascus Gate, which left three people dead, and two ambushes that wounded seven Israelis.
Early Monday morning, Palestinian gunmen killed a married couple and wounded two of their children south of Nablus. Israeli soldiers shot three Palestinian militants Sunday in Gaza and the West Bank.
On Monday, Israel announced that it had arrested Mazen Foqha, a leading Hamas activist in the West Bank, for allegedly supplying the explosives for Sunday's bus attack.
The Palestinian violence has intensified since an Israeli airstrike July 22 killed senior Hamas militant Salah Shehadeh and 14 other Palestinians, most of them children, in Gaza. Since then, Palestinian militants have killed 27 Israelis, and Hamas has vowed to carry out more attacks.
On Monday, Israel clamped down harder on Palestinian travel throughout much of the West Bank as a Palestinian man reportedly on a bombing mission prematurely exploded himself inside a car in northern Israel, killing himself and wounding the driver.
Israeli tanks choked off the southern town of Rafah, a hotbed of Palestinian violence, and sealed the northern West Bank. Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer defended Israel's moves to prevent Palestinian attacks, saying that about 140 would-be bombers have been captured. He did not indicate the time frame.
Under the new restrictions, Palestinians will not be able to drive between the towns of Jenin, Nablus, Tulkarem, Qalqiliya and Ramallah, the Israeli army said.
''Nobody enters and nobody leaves,'' Ben-Eliezer said. The goal, he said, is ``a much bigger closure than we are doing at the present.''
Senior Palestinian officials denounced the restrictions, saying they would not make Israelis safe.
''This is now the biggest jail in history, Gaza and the West Bank,'' chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said in an interview.
Strict limits on Palestinian travel have been in place since the Israeli-Palestinian violence broke out in late September 2000.
Israel also has initiated other attempts to deter suicide bombers. Over the weekend, Israeli soldiers demolished 11 houses that belonged to the families of previous suicide bombers in Hebron, Jenin and Nablus, a strategy also used decades ago against Palestinian attackers.
Israel hopes that would-be bombers will not attack if they know their actions could harm their families. The demolitions also could provide an incentive for relatives to convince would-be attackers to stop their missions.
'We will continue with demolition of terrorists' houses. We will begin exiling the families of suicide bombers, but only if there is a clear link proven between them and the act,'' Ben-Eliezer said.
Also on Monday, Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres urged Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak to help jump-start the peace process. At a news conference in Cairo, Mubarak urged Israel to resume talks with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, whom Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has refused to meet.
After Sunday's attacks, Israeli-Palestinian talks on security and easing economic hardships for Palestinians were postponed, said Israeli government spokesman Ra'anan Gissin. The talks had been scheduled for later this week.
''We're in the middle of a wave of terrorist activity,'' Gissin said. ``We first have to take care of that. Then we can talk.''
Meanwhile, during a U.N. General Assembly meeting, the Palestinians claimed Monday that a U.N. report confirmed Israel committed ''war crimes'' during its recent military offensive across the West Bank.
But Israel countered that last week's report by Secretary-General Kofi Annan found no evidence to support Palestinian claims that Israel massacred 500 people.
Source. (http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/world/3806182.htm)
BY SUDARSAN RAGHAVAN
Herald World Staff
JERUSALEM - Israeli helicopters pummeled Palestinian targets in Gaza City on Monday night, retaliating for a wave of attacks that killed 14 Israelis and wounded scores over a 24-hour period.
After circling the city, one of the helicopters fired several missiles at a metalworks factory near the center of Gaza City, injuring five people, including a teenager, said witnesses and hospital workers. People ran for cover and ambulances rushed to treat the wounded. Women were screaming and men ordered their children to get inside their homes.
The 20-minute assault temporarily knocked out the electricity grid, plunging portions of the city into darkness.
Israel said the factory was a bomb-making workshop and that the airstrikes were the latest attempt to knock out the ''terrorist infrastructure'' of the militant Islamic group Hamas.
Hamas, which is based in Gaza, has claimed responsibility for two bombings in the past week, one at Jerusalem's Hebrew University, which killed seven people, including five Americans, and the suicide bombing of a bus Sunday, which killed nine people in northern Galilee.
The bus bombing was the first of a wave of Palestinian attacks over the weekend, including a dramatic shootout near Jerusalem's Damascus Gate, which left three people dead, and two ambushes that wounded seven Israelis.
Early Monday morning, Palestinian gunmen killed a married couple and wounded two of their children south of Nablus. Israeli soldiers shot three Palestinian militants Sunday in Gaza and the West Bank.
On Monday, Israel announced that it had arrested Mazen Foqha, a leading Hamas activist in the West Bank, for allegedly supplying the explosives for Sunday's bus attack.
The Palestinian violence has intensified since an Israeli airstrike July 22 killed senior Hamas militant Salah Shehadeh and 14 other Palestinians, most of them children, in Gaza. Since then, Palestinian militants have killed 27 Israelis, and Hamas has vowed to carry out more attacks.
On Monday, Israel clamped down harder on Palestinian travel throughout much of the West Bank as a Palestinian man reportedly on a bombing mission prematurely exploded himself inside a car in northern Israel, killing himself and wounding the driver.
Israeli tanks choked off the southern town of Rafah, a hotbed of Palestinian violence, and sealed the northern West Bank. Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer defended Israel's moves to prevent Palestinian attacks, saying that about 140 would-be bombers have been captured. He did not indicate the time frame.
Under the new restrictions, Palestinians will not be able to drive between the towns of Jenin, Nablus, Tulkarem, Qalqiliya and Ramallah, the Israeli army said.
''Nobody enters and nobody leaves,'' Ben-Eliezer said. The goal, he said, is ``a much bigger closure than we are doing at the present.''
Senior Palestinian officials denounced the restrictions, saying they would not make Israelis safe.
''This is now the biggest jail in history, Gaza and the West Bank,'' chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said in an interview.
Strict limits on Palestinian travel have been in place since the Israeli-Palestinian violence broke out in late September 2000.
Israel also has initiated other attempts to deter suicide bombers. Over the weekend, Israeli soldiers demolished 11 houses that belonged to the families of previous suicide bombers in Hebron, Jenin and Nablus, a strategy also used decades ago against Palestinian attackers.
Israel hopes that would-be bombers will not attack if they know their actions could harm their families. The demolitions also could provide an incentive for relatives to convince would-be attackers to stop their missions.
'We will continue with demolition of terrorists' houses. We will begin exiling the families of suicide bombers, but only if there is a clear link proven between them and the act,'' Ben-Eliezer said.
Also on Monday, Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres urged Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak to help jump-start the peace process. At a news conference in Cairo, Mubarak urged Israel to resume talks with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, whom Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has refused to meet.
After Sunday's attacks, Israeli-Palestinian talks on security and easing economic hardships for Palestinians were postponed, said Israeli government spokesman Ra'anan Gissin. The talks had been scheduled for later this week.
''We're in the middle of a wave of terrorist activity,'' Gissin said. ``We first have to take care of that. Then we can talk.''
Meanwhile, during a U.N. General Assembly meeting, the Palestinians claimed Monday that a U.N. report confirmed Israel committed ''war crimes'' during its recent military offensive across the West Bank.
But Israel countered that last week's report by Secretary-General Kofi Annan found no evidence to support Palestinian claims that Israel massacred 500 people.
Source. (http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/world/3806182.htm)