GAZA, 14 September — A column of 50 Israeli tanks made a fresh incursion into the Gaza Strip yesterday. Twenty-six-year-old Sobhi Zeynou was killed when the tanks shelled Rafah town, at the far southern end of the Strip, in the latest in a string of incursions into the territory. Six other Palestinians were wounded, three of them seriously, by automatic weapons fire. The Israeli Army also arrested dozens of people in the occupied Palestinian territories.
Separately, three brothers, including a member of the Islamic Jihad movement, died and eight Palestinians were injured in an explosion that rocked Jabaliya refugee camp in Gaza. The blast occurred in the house of Iyad Al-Sharif, a Fatah member. Iyad was seriously wounded.
The tanks that went into Rafah were backed up by two helicopter gunships that kept up a constant fire as the column moved through the town. The troops were accompanied by two bulldozers that razed at least one house and a metal workshop.
Residents, roused by appeals broadcast through mosque loudspeakers, took up arms. Many others fled. The incursion, which lasted several hours, was the army’s third major raid in Gaza this week, signaling a renewed focus on the narrow strip of land bordering Egypt. Earlier, military sources said an explosive charge went off as an Israeli troops convoy passed near the Netzarim settlement in the northern Gaza Strip, while two makeshift rockets hit an Israeli village in the Negev Desert. Neither incident caused any casualties.
A senior Palestinian official called on the so-called Quartet of top Middle East peace players, which is to meet next Tuesday in New York, to “put a halt to the Israeli aggression.” “We call on the Quarter (United States, European Union, United Nations and Russia) to put a halt to the Israeli aggression and secure implementation of (UN) Security Council calls for an immediate Israeli withdrawal to allow the re-launch of negotiations,” Arafat’s adviser Nabil Abu Rudeina said.
