GAZA CITY, 12 January — In yet another act of blatant terror, Israel yesterday launched a second straight day of aggression against Palestinians, sending tanks into a Gaza Strip town after tearing up the runway at the Palestinians’ airport.

Later in the evening, Israeli tanks stormed the Gaza Strip airport again after bulldozing the runway of the airport, amid growing international pressure on the Palestinian Authority over a seized arms shipment. Palestinian security sources and witnesses said the tanks pushed three kilometers into Rafah, on the Egyptian border in a predawn raid, and that troops sealed off surrounding roads.

A 62-year-old Palestinian man died of a heart attack when the troops fired on his home near a hospital, medical sources said. Around the same time, Israeli troops arrested a militant from the resistance group Hamas during a raid on an autonomous Palestinian village in the West Bank, an Israeli military spokesman said.

The Palestinian Authority, already on the defensive over growing evidence it was involved in an attempt to smuggle 50 tons of arms into the territories, condemned the actions. "The Palestinian Authority is warning this Israeli aggression will make a big explosion ... create more violence in the region," said Nabil Abu Rudeina, a senior adviser to Palestinian President Yasser Arafat. Col. Khaled Abu Al-Ula, head of the liaison committee in the Gaza Strip, charged the incursion constituted a "reoccupation of the sector."

An Israeli military spokesman said the troops had only taken up positions on roads "under Israeli security control." He added that Israeli commandos had captured eight Palestinians in the Rafah area who had been wanted for "arms smuggling."

Palestinian security forces arrested yesterday three Palestinian officials accused by Israel of involvement in a bid to smuggle the shipload of weapons, authorities said. An internal panel of inquiry appointed by the Palestinian Authority said the men — identified as a major general in the security apparatus and two naval police officers — were called for questioning and then taken into custody. The announcement was made shortly after US Secretary of State Colin Powell backed Israel’s demand that Arafat arrest those responsible for the alleged smuggling plot.

Washington, meanwhile, focused on evidence allegedly linking Arafat’s administration to the weapons on a ship seized by Israeli commandos in the Red Sea last week. US President George W. Bush said he had growing suspicions the arms were meant to "promote terror" and urged Arafat to punish those behind it.

Powell yesterday defended Israel’s military operation , calling it a "defensive action" to counter weapons smuggling. In addition, Powell further ratcheted up pressure on Arafat to stop issuing denials related to the seizure of the ship in the Red Sea that contained 50 tons of weapons and take immediate action to arrest those responsible. "It’s a response the Israelis have taken in response to this latest provocation," Powell said, describing the Israeli actions in Gaza.

"The Israelis are responding to this incident of smuggling of weapons into the region by going after other ways of smuggling weapons into the region," Powell said in an interview with wire service reporters.

Also yesterday, Israeli soldiers attacked hundreds of Palestinians in Ramallah, in the West Bank, slightly wounding four of them, medical sources and an AFP correspondent said. The medical sources told AFP that one man in the crowd was moderately wounded in his foot after being hit by a live bullet, and that three others were lightly wounded by rubber bullets.