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Israel takes over belt of northern Gaza

Posted on: Wednesday, 5 July 2006, 19:56 CDT

By Nidal al-Mughrabi

GAZA (Reuters) - Israeli armored forces took over a belt of the northern Gaza Strip on Thursday, expanding an offensive after militants fired rockets that hit a major city, Palestinian security sources said.

Under covering fire from helicopter gunships, tanks moved into an area including the rubble of three of the Jewish settlements evacuated when Israel abandoned the Gaza Strip last summer after 38 years of occupation.

The Israeli army said that troops had begun moving into the northern Gaza Strip, from where militants fire rockets into Israel, but gave no further details. It has said it does not intend to permanently reoccupy the territory.

Israel vowed on Wednesday to step up a Gaza incursion begun with the goal of bringing home a captured soldier after rockets fired hit the city of Ashkelon, 12 km (7 miles) inside Israeli territory, the furthest the rockets have flown.

The rocket fire has compounded the crisis over the capture of Corporal Gilad Shalit in a cross-border raid on June 25 by militants from Gaza, including members of the governing Hamas Islamist movement.

Late on Wednesday, Israeli air strikes killed a Hamas gunman and a policeman in northern Gaza, bringing the death toll to 10 -- nearly all of them militants -- since the Jewish state began its offensive.

"The Israeli army will strike at the terrorist elements, Hamas above all, at the time and place we find proper," Defense Minister Amir Peretz said in a speech at a naval base on Wednesday.

"We won't sink in the Gaza swamp, but will enter any necessary area to carry out our missions."

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan urged Israelis and Palestinians to "step back from the brink," warning that their escalating confrontation could soon turn explosive.

Source: REUTERS

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