GAZA CITY , 13 January— Israeli Navy gunships shelled the harbor in Gaza City early yesterday, destroying a Palestinian coast guard ship, after the Palestinian Authority ordered the arrest of three of its own officials on suspicion of smuggling arms by sea. The action came amid allegations that the Authority was smuggling arms into the Gaza Strip, after the Israeli Navy boarded and seized an arms-laden freighter in the Red Sea last week.
The harbor area was rocked by the resounding sound of at least two shells being launched as the early morning attack left some boats ablaze and destroyed a fuel dump, security sources said. The shelling destroyed two boats, one of which was the Palestinian naval vessel, the Gindalla, an Israeli military statement said.
Meanwhile, the Palestinian Authority has jailed three of its own officials, including two senior naval officers, for their alleged role in the affair in which the Karine A, stocked with 50 tons of weapons, was intercepted, officials in Gaza said. It has accused vice admirals Fethi Razem and Fuad Shubaki and arms buyer Adel Moghrabi of responsibility for the foiled smuggling operation, officials said.
All three men have also been implicated by the Israelis in the affair, and an official commission of inquiry set up by the Palestinian Authority has asked Israel to help in the investigation. Israel alleges that the Palestinian Authority ordered the cargo of weapons, a charge the Authority has denied. The Gaza wharf attack followed a second straight day of Israeli aggression into the Gaza Strip, which included the bulldozing of dozens of homes, and which were alleged to be in retaliation for the killing of four Israeli soldiers.
The Israeli Army had sent tanks into Rafah and used bulldozers to tear up the runway at the nearby Palestinian airport on Friday and were continuing to dig up the runway yesterday morning, a military statement said. The army also said it had dynamited a tunnel it had discovered under a house in Rafah. Ten Palestinians from the Rafah refugee camp, including children, were wounded by tank fire during the operation.
Meanwhile, the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas promised yesterday it would retaliate for Israel’s demolition of homes this week in Rafah, saying this "terrorist act will not go unpunished." It echoed Friday’s warning from the armed wing of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, which issued a statement promising "painful punishment" for the razings.
The Hamas warning came as two members of the movement, who killed four Israeli soldiers three days ago, were buried in Rafah in a funeral attended by more than 3,000 people. More than one hundred gunmen fired into the air for the burial of Muhammad Abu Jamus and Imad Abu Riziq.
In the latest allegation of arms smuggling, senior Israeli officials have accused Palestinian President Yasser Arafat of having used his personal airplane to deliver weapons to the Palestinian territories through Gaza airport, Israeli public radio reported. It is because of this that the Israeli government decided to make Gaza international airport, near Rafah on the Israeli-Egyptian border, completely unusable, the radio said, without providing further details.
The Palestinian leadership condemned remarks made Friday by US Secretary of State Colin Powell, in which he described the latest Israeli military operations in the Gaza Strip as "defensive actions" to counter weapons smuggling.
