Israel approves Gaza strikes to clear rocket zone

By Matthew Tostevin

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel has given a green light for
intensified airstrikes inside the Gaza Strip to enforce a
buffer zone meant to stop Palestinian militants from firing
rockets, officials said on Friday.

But in a sign of growing friction over the cross-border
violence, Palestinian security forces said they had refused an
Israeli request to evacuate the area.

The makeshift rockets rarely cause casualties, but could
have big political fallout as Prime Minister Ariel Sharon
campaigns for re-election on the strength of a pullout from
Gaza this year that he said would boost Israel’s security.

Despite the withdrawal, the rocket firing has not stopped,
and Israel has mounted air and artillery strikes at Gaza.

Militants say the rockets are to avenge Israeli raids in
the occupied West Bank as well as its strikes into the Gaza
Strip.

On Thursday, four Israeli soldiers were wounded when a
rocket hit their base after Israeli troops killed three
militants in the West Bank. One rocket fell on Friday.

Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz’s office said that, after
discussion on Thursday, “he has ordered a restriction of
movement in those areas from which the Palestinian terrorist
organizations fire rockets into Israel.”

Another security source made clear that this meant use of
air power, not ground operations.

PALESTINIANS STAY PUT

But Palestinian forces said they had refused an Israeli
request to evacuate the border zone and were continuing their
own efforts to prevent rocket firing from amid the rubble of
former Jewish settlements at the border.

“We will not move one inch,” said Assayed Shaban, commander
of forces in northern Gaza. “We are also making a 100 percent
effort to prevent rocket firing.”

The cross-border violence has quickly soured any hopes that
the Gaza pullout could lead to a quick return to peacemaking.

Israel rules out any talks on statehood in the West Bank
and Gaza until the Palestinian authorities disarm militants, a
process that is meant to start under a U.S.-backed peace plan.

Israeli security sources said further steps were being
considered if the rocket fire did not stop. These include
cutting off Gaza’s electricity — a proposal denounced by human
rights groups as collective punishment.

A ground offensive to re-occupy parts of Gaza is unlikely
unless rockets cause heavy casualties, the sources said.

The stakes are particularly high for Sharon ahead of the
election on March 28, for which the ex-general quit his
rightist Likud to move toward the political center.

Opinion polls suggest Sharon’s Kadima party has a big lead.

But more attacks, particularly from Gaza, could strengthen
the hand of his main challenger from the right, Likud’s
Benjamin Netanyahu, who denounced the Gaza pullout as a
surrender to Palestinian militants that would only encourage
attacks.

A dramatic surge in violence could also create problems for
a Palestinian parliamentary election on January 25, and
potentially force a delay.

Militants said they would keep up the barrages whatever
Israel did. “We will not tremble from these threats,” said Abu
Abir of the Popular Resistance Committees.

(Additional reporting by Ori Lewis in Jerusalem, Nidal
al-Mughrabi in Gaza)