Israelis wreck 17 homes as violence flares anew

GAZA - Israeli troops battled Palestinian gunmen, wounding at least four, and demolished 17 Palestinian homes in a fresh flareup of violence in the Gaza Strip yesterday.

Palestinian witnesses and security officials said Israeli bulldozers and tanks entered a Palestinian refugee camp in Rafah near the Gaza-Egypt border in one of the fiercer battles since a US-mediated ceasefire was announced in June.

The battle followed a Palestinian suicide mission in Gaza on Monday in which the bomber alone was killed, and mortar bomb fire on two Jewish settlements in the strip.

Palestinian witnesses said Israeli troops wrecked as many as 17 homes, and gunmen, including members of the Palestinian Authority's National Security Forces, opened fire on the soldiers.

Hospital sources said four Palestinians were wounded before the Israeli forces pulled back.

The Palestinian security chief in Gaza, Major-General Abdel-Razek Al-Majaydeh, said Israel had launched "a savage attack against a Palestinian refugee camp under full Palestinian control in a new campaign to destroy more houses and to terrorise innocent residents."

Al-Majaydeh commands the National Security Forces.

Earlier, the United States criticised both sides for fresh bloodshed and State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said: "We're deeply troubled over the upsurge ... in violence over the weekend."

Eighteen Palestinians and 10 Israelis have been killed since the truce drawn up by US CIA Director George Tenet was to have taken effect on June 13. Each side accuses the other of actions that prevented the ceasefire becoming effective.

- REUTERS

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