GAZA CTIY, 27 April 2008 — A 14-year-old girl was killed and six other people were wounded in a new Israeli invasion early yesterday in the northern Gaza Strip town of Beit Lahiya. Witnesses and medical sources said that the mother and two members of the family were among the injuries.
Israeli forces grabbed a Hamas field commander from his Gaza home yesterday, setting off heavy fighting that killed his daughter. Mariam Talat Marouf was killed when Israeli tank shells directly hit her family house.
The sources said that her body was found thrown near the house, which was seriously damaged. The sources added that after midnight, an Israeli undercover unit backed by combat helicopters and drones infiltrated into Beit Lahiya and surrounded Mariam’s father’s house, and targeted the house with heavy gunfire.
The target of the raid was Talat Hassan Marouf. Hamas did not provide details about Marouf, but as a field commander in the border area with Israel he would presumably be involved in firing rockets at Israeli border communities.
Israeli forces surrounded Marouf’s house, with the family inside, and heavy fighting erupted. Mariam was killed by shrapnel from machine-gunfire, said medics at an area hospital, Al-Awda. Her mother was injured, along with nine others, said Dr. Moawiya Hassanain, a senior Palestinian Health Ministry official.
