MIDDLE EAST: Eight killed in series of raids as Israel steps up its military campaign in Gaza

Record ID: 340410

  • Title: MIDDLE EAST: Eight killed in series of raids as Israel steps up its military campaign in Gaza
  • Date: 12th April 2008
  • Summary: (BN15) EL BUREIJ REFUGEE CAMP, GAZA (APRIL 11, 2008) (REUTERS) WIDE OF MASKED MILITANT FROM THE AL-QUDS BRIGADES, AFFILIATED WITH ISLAMIC JIHAD, PREPARING FOR BATTLE WITH ISRAELI FORCES
  • Embargoed: 27th April 2008 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Topics: International Relations,Defence / Military
  • Reuters ID: LVADIFI70V09IHS32L5PIQHQTYV4
  • Story Text: Israeli forces killed four Palestinian militants and four civilians, including an 11-year-old boy, in assaults on the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip on Friday (April 11), the Islamist faction and medical officials said.
    The operations near the communities of el Bureij and Khan Younis followed a vow by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to answer a deadly Palestinian assault on a Gaza border terminal on Wednesday (April 9) with a stepped-up military campaign against Hamas.
    Troops backed by tanks and helicopter gunships moved into el Bureij, in central Gaza, on what an Israeli military spokeswoman described as a mission "to disrupt the terrorist infrastructure and distance terrorists from the border fence".
    Palestinian officials said Israeli ground forces killed four civilians, one of them a boy.
    Three additional Palestinian civilians were killed in the el Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip, where Israeli forces are operating since the morning.
    An Israeli army spokeswoman said forces operating in the central Gaza Strip shot several militants who fired at the troops. She had no details on their identity.
    Militants from the Al-Quds Brigades, affiliated with Islamic Jihad, took cover in an orchard in the el Bureij refugee camp, and prepared to fight the Israeli army.
    Heavily masked, one of them claimed that two combat groups had hit two Israeli tanks and an army bulldozer with rocket propelled grenades (RPGs).
    An Israeli army spokeswoman said the tanks had been fired on but all the armoured vehicles were still operating.
    Hours earlier, Israeli air strikes killed two Palestinian gunmen of Islamist Hamas near the southern Gaza town of Khan Younis. Seven other gunmen were wounded in the attacks, the medical officials said. A funeral for the two dead was held in el Bureij camp in the afternoon. The army confirmed the overnight air strike.
    On the Israeli side of the border, soldiers escorted blindfolded Palestinian detainees arrested during the raids to an army base, where they will be questioned.
    In the latest attack on Friday (April 11) evening, a helicopter missile strike killed a Hamas gunman and a fighter from the Army of the Nation, an al Qaeda-inspired Gazan faction, the Palestinian officials said. The military spokeswoman said Israeli forces attacked several gunmen during clashes.
    Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Thursday (April 10) warned Israel would strike Hamas after Gaza militants killed two Israeli civilians at a border oil terminal with Israel.
    Israel, which withdrew forces and settlers in 2005, frequently mounts raids into the Gaza Strip in what it says is an attempt to stop militants from firing rockets at southern Israeli towns. Several days of fighting six weeks ago left more than 120 Palestinians and three Israelis dead.
    Hamas seized Gaza after routing forces loyal to President Mahmoud Abbas of Fatah in June.
    On Thursday (April 10), Israel halted all flow of fuel into the Gaza Strip, one day after Palestinian militants attacked the fuel terminal on the border that is used to supply the territory, killing two Israeli civilian employees of the facility.
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