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Israelis Kill Four Hamas Fighters in Gaza

Posted on: Sunday, 24 August 2003, 06:00 CDT

Israeli helicopters killed four Hamas fighters in a missile strike in the Gaza Strip Sunday, hours after its army chief declared all Hamas members "potential targets for liquidation."

The strike came as Palestinian leaders, under pressure from the United States and Israel to crack down on militants after a deadly Hamas suicide bombing in Jerusalem, were locked in a power struggle over control over their security forces.

Israeli officials have repeatedly warned of a sustained military campaign against the armed groups unless the Palestinian Authority moves decisively against them. The helicopters struck after Palestinian militants fired a new longer-range missile into Israel Sunday.

"Israel has no choice but act in those areas where the Palestinians are failing to do so," said Gideon Meir, a senior Israeli Foreign Ministry official.

Palestinian officials said the raid would undermine a planned Palestinian security clampdown that began Saturday with moves against arms smugglers, casting fresh doubt on an already shaky U.S.-backed peace plan.

"This aims to sabotage the efforts that began last night," said Saeb Erakat, a veteran Palestinian lawmaker. "It's very obvious that the Israeli government is acting as if the Palestinian Authority is something from the past."

Witnesses in Gaza City said Apache helicopters that had approached under cover of darkness fired at least three missiles at a group of armed men sitting near the crowded beach front. At least five bystanders were injured.

Hamas identified the dead men as Hamas fighters Ahmed Aishtawi, Wahid Hamas, Ahmad Aub Helal and Mohammed Abu Lubda.

An Israeli military official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Aishtawi was the main target, describing him as a senior operative who had planned and executed attacks in Gaza and the West Bank.

A Hamas spokesman said Aishtawi was the leader of a unit that pioneered the firing of homemade missiles and was specialized in hitting tanks.

Earlier Sunday, a rocket fired from the Gaza Strip landed on a beach four miles from the Israeli city of Ashkelon. It was the deepest a Palestinian rocket has struck in Israel in recent memory, the army said.

The crude projectiles are regularly fired from Gaza into Israel and at Jewish settlements in Gaza. They rarely cause damage or injury. But Israel has moved armored vehicles up to the border in recent days and said it was ready for an onslaught on the militants.

"Every member of Hamas is a potential target for liquidation," Israeli army chief Lt. Gen. Moshe Yaalon said Sunday, the first senior military official to outline the policy, adopted after the bus bombing.

"If at the end of the day, the Palestinian Authority doesn't move against them, we will have to do so."

In the last three years of fighting, Israel has killed scores of wanted militants in targeted attacks. Palestinian armed groups called off a two-month ceasefire last week after a similar Israeli air strike in Gaza killed Ismail Abu Shanab, a senior Hamas political leader.

Hamas remained defiant Sunday.

"If the Israelis thought assassinations would destroy our determination to continue in our resistance, to continue defending ourselves, they are mistaken," Hamas spokesman Ismail Haniya said. "We will move ahead whatever the sacrifice."

The Palestinian leadership, meanwhile, was in crisis after Yasser Arafat clashed with his rival, U.S.-backed Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas, over Arafat's refusal to relinquish control over security forces.

Abbas and his security chief, Dahlan, have said they need control over all men under arms to confront the militants. but Arafat still controls the main Palestinian security forces.

In a meeting of Arafat's Fatah movement Saturday, several members proposed appointing Gen. Nasser Yousef, a long-time Arafat loyalist, as overall commander of security forces. But another gathering broke up late Sunday without agreement, a senior Palestinian official said.

Abbas on Sunday stood by Dahlen, who has fallen out with Arafat and is unpopular in Fatah's top circles.

Appointing Yousef, with only some forces under his control, "is a wrong approach that changes nothing," Abbas told Israel TV's Channel Two. Abbas said Dahlan would not resign.

Dahlan's forces, meanwhile, continued arresting weapons smugglers in the Gaza Strip, seizing weapons and detaining at least 15 suspects in a sweep begun late Saturday. Security forces said they sealed off six tunnels used to smuggle in weapons from Egypt.

In the West Bank city of Nablus, the Israeli army said it uncovered a bomb lab Sunday, blowing up the site where they found an 176-pound bomb and bomb-making materials.

Two rockets similar to those fired from the Gaza Strip were found in the explosives factory, the army and witnesses said. It is unusual for the army to find rockets in the West Bank, which is in closer range to central Israeli cities than the Gaza Strip.

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