Israeli officials on Monday defended a raid and missile strike that killed 14 Palestinians and wounded 80 in the Gaza Strip city of Khan Yunis, saying the pre-dawn attack was aimed at showing the Islamic militant group Hamas that “there is no place safe” from the Israeli army.
Israel’s display of force prompted swift international criticism and cautionary words from the United States, which is struggling to build support in the Arab world and elsewhere for its hard line against Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.
The incursion by 40 tanks backed by helicopters came on the same day of an unusual clash later between Palestinian Authority police and Hamas militants over the kidnapping and killing of a police commander. By early Monday evening, Palestinian Authority police seeking suspects in the killing had shot to death four Hamas fighters.
Accounts of the Israeli attack diverged widely, with Israel saying that most of those killed were armed militants while the Palestinians said all of the dead were civilians. Most of the victims were gathering outside a mosque when an Israeli helicopter gunship fired the missile, witnesses and Palestinian officials said.
An Israeli commander called the assault part of “an intensified campaign” to weaken Hamas in one of its strongholds. The Islamic group, which opposes the existence of Israel, sponsors suicide bombings and other terror attacks against civilians.
“We intend to continue hitting Hamas everywhere,” said Brig. Gen. Israel Ziv, indicating renewed interest by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to take on Hamas.
Israelis and Palestinians also disagreed on whether troops deliberately targeted Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis later Monday morning. Palestinians said the hospital took direct mortar hits. Israeli military officials said the soldiers were responding to mortar fire, and the hospital may have been caught in the exchange.
Palestinian news accounts also disputed that Hamas was hit by the attack. Militants in the crowd, the Palestinians said, were mostly from the Fatah movement of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.
Ziv said the army, which had been responding initially to a rocket attack on a nearby Jewish settlement, sought arms factories as part of the raid’s military objective. Soldiers uncovered two small workshops, Ziv said, and captured one man in the raid.
Ziv said the missile launch was ordered when soldiers, in armored vehicles and helicopter gunships, began to withdraw, and about 20 to 25 armed Palestinians were observed “through visual intelligence” to be advancing.
The Palestinian deaths and casualties were the largest one-day totals since July, when Israel dropped a 1-ton bomb in a Gaza neighborhood to kill a top Hamas military commander. That attack killed 13 civilians as well as the Hamas chief.
State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said the U.S. was “deeply troubled by the reports of Israeli actions in Gaza over the weekend,” adding, “We’ve always respected Israel’s right to defend itself, including going after armed groups and armed men in some of these areas.
“The Israeli military must exercise the utmost discipline and care to avoid harm to civilians,” he said.
European Union negotiator Javier Solana, visiting the region, told reporters he was shocked by the number of casualties. Twenty-five of the injured were in critical condition, doctors said. Most suffered shrapnel wounds in the head, chest and abdomen. The dead ranged in age from 14 to 52.
The dead, wrapped in Palestinian flags, were taken from the hospital on stretchers, carried by gunmen firing in the air and shouting, “Revenge, revenge.”
“Everyone should know that as our people were not safe in Khan Yunis, so Israelis will not be safe in Tel Aviv,” said Abdel Aziz Rantisi, a Hamas leader. “We will strike everywhere.”
As the Israeli raid in Gaza eased, there was another crisis Monday–the assassination of a Palestinian police commander Monday morning allegedly by a well-known Hamas militant. The kidnapping and killing of Police Col. Rajeh Abu Lihya, whose body was dumped in the center of Gaza City, sparked unrest and bloodshed among Palestinian factions and forces throughout the day.
Hamas fighters killed
Seeking to force the surrender of the suspected killers, Palestinian Authority police shot to death four Hamas fighters. Gun battles between Palestinian police and Hamas were reported to continue through the night in the refugee camps of Nusaryat in the central Gaza Strip.
Hamas leaders disputed that the militant group had targeted Lihya. Palestinian security sources said Monday that the killing appeared to be tied to a revenge killing by Hamas militant Emad Aqel, whose younger brother was killed two years ago when Palestinian police quelled street protests with gunfire.
Lihya was kidnapped Monday morning by more than a dozen masked men as he left for work. Lihya, hidden in a station wagon with some gunmen, apparently was screaming for help when the car passed along a main street in Gaza City, Palestinian police and witnesses said.
Traffic cops tried to help Lihya but were stopped when gunmen threw him out of the car and riddled his body with bullets, according to Palestinian police sources. Hours of gunfights followed between followers of Aqel and members of the Palestinian Authority security force.
Tensions escalate
The day turned chaotic as other militant groups apparently also drew guns and attacked police stations in Nusaryat and the nearby town of Al Marazi. Palestinian police released a statement linking Lihya’s death to a Hamas operation and as a revenge killing by the Aqel family.
The outbreak of Palestinian-against-Palestinian violence clearly shook top Palestinian security officials, some of whom attributed the dispute to a “tribal issue.”
Mohammed Dahlan, the former security chief for the West Bank who now acts as a top security adviser to Arafat, called for calm.
“Saying this is a family problem doesn’t get Hamas out of this crime,” Dahlan said on Al Jazeera television Monday night, vowing that the Palestinian Authority would “use all methods to keep order and national unity.”
“We will not be pulled into a civil war,” Dahlan said. “It’s not right that a Palestinian police officer got killed in broad daylight over a family problem. . . . This will only lead the Palestinian people to bloodshed and internal problems.”
