Israeli forces take over area of northern Gaza strip

Israel said no decision had been made that would amount to a reoccupation. Picture / Reuters

GAZA - Israeli armoured forces took over a belt of the northern Gaza Strip on Thursday, expanding an offensive after militants fired rockets that hit a major city, Palestinian security sources said.

Under covering fire from helicopter gunships, tanks moved into an area including the rubble of three of the Jewish settlements evacuated when Israel abandoned the Gaza Strip last summer after 38 years of occupation.

The Israeli army said that troops had begun moving into the northern Gaza Strip, from where militants fire rockets into Israel, but gave no further details. It has said it does not intend to permanently reoccupy the territory.

Israel vowed on Wednesday to step up a Gaza incursion begun with the goal of bringing home a captured soldier after rockets fired hit the city of Ashkelon, 12 km (7 miles) inside Israeli territory, the furthest the rockets have flown.

The rocket fire has compounded the crisis over the capture of Corporal Gilad Shalit in a cross-border raid on June 25 by militants from Gaza, including members of the governing Hamas Islamist movement.

Late on Wednesday, Israeli air strikes killed a Hamas gunman and a policeman in northern Gaza, bringing the death toll to 10 - nearly all of them militants - since the Jewish state began its offensive.

"The Israeli army will strike at the terrorist elements, Hamas above all, at the time and place we find proper," Defence Minister Amir Peretz said in a speech at a naval base on Wednesday.

"We won't sink in the Gaza swamp, but will enter any necessary area to carry out our missions."

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan urged Israelis and Palestinians to "step back from the brink," warning that their escalating confrontation could soon turn explosive.

Hamas militants were among three factions from Gaza who seized Corporal Gilad Shalit - a 19-year-old tank gunner - in a cross-border raid on June 25.

"Given the abduction and continued ballistic salvoes ... the rules of the game in dealing with the Palestinian Authority and Hamas must be changed," said a statement issued by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's office before the latest rocket attack.

A spokesman said no decision had been made that would amount to Israel re-occupying parts of the Gaza Strip, which it quit last year after 38 years of occupation.

One Palestinian source close to negotiations with Egyptian mediators said the militants were ready to release Shalit if Israel set a timetable for freeing some prisoners. Israel has rejected any negotiations or prisoner swap.

- REUTERS