GAZA CITY/RAMALLAH — Israeli troops yesterday killed four Palestinians in their latest assault on the Gaza Strip as hard-line Prime Minister Ehud Olmert unveiled plans to protect nearby homes from rockets. Troops supported by helicopter gunships moved into the southern Gaza Strip overnight, killing a civilian and three militants from the armed wing of the Islamist Hamas movement that has ruled the Strip since June, medics said.
The operation was aimed at “infrastructures of terrorist organizations,” an Israeli military spokesman told reporters. The army completed the operation by midafternoon and withdrew its forces from Gaza after arresting 20 Palestinians, army radio reported.
The latest invasion came as Olmert unveiled plans to reinforce Israeli homes near the border with Gaza which have come under near-daily rocket and mortar attack in recent months.
“Fifteen schools are already completely secure, and today we will decide on proposals which will be brought for government approval next week and are aimed at completing reinforcement measures,” Olmert told a weekly Cabinet meeting in Jerusalem.
He then held a special ministerial meeting to discuss a new proposal for supplying bomb shelters to homes near the Gaza border.
Israel has been on heightened alert in recent days following the killing of a top commander in the Lebanese Hezbollah militia in Damascus last week in an explosion Hezbollah blamed on Israel. Israel celebrated the death of Imad Mughniyeh but denied any involvement in his death.
Israel’s Defense Minister Ehud Barak yesterday warned of a possible revenge attack from Hezbollah, possibly with the help of its sponsors Syria and Iran. “Israel has no interest in an escalation, but in view of recent events we are preparing accordingly,” he said.
A Syrian newspaper yesterday quoted what it called a “well-informed source” saying that a number of suspects of Arab nationality had been arrested in connection with Mughniyeh’s killing.
Israel is, meanwhile, pushing ahead with recently revived peace talks with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, whose forces were routed from Gaza last summer. Olmert and Abbas will meet for the next round of talks tomorrow, while negotiating teams have been discussing the thorniest issues in the decades-old conflict since last month.
In another development, Israeli forces yesterday erected additional military checkpoints impeding the movement of Palestinians in and out of the West Bank city of Nablus. Palestinian sources said that the Israeli forces have re-erected a military checkpoint near the Yitzhar junction five kilometers south of the fixed Huwwara checkpoint at the southern entrance of Nablus. In northern Nablus, the Israeli forces reimposed the military checkpoint at Al-Badhan valley, blocking all traffic out of the city, and allowing passage into Nablus only after extensive security search.
—With input from agencies
