PCHR Killings
B'Tselem Fatalities
A Brutal Routine
Science of Suicide Bombing
Settler Violence
1st Month: 28 boys, 140
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Israel and Palestine
Israel Carries Out Airstrikes Despite Agreement - New York Times: "By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS | Published: July 31, 2006
QANA, Lebanon (AP) -- Israeli planes hit targets in southern Lebanon on Monday after Hezbollah guerrillas blasted an Israeli tank and injured three Israeli soldiers, breaking a brief respite in 20 days of fighting.
Before the fighting resumed, pickup trucks and cars loaded with people streamed north as thousands of civilians trapped in south Lebanon's war zone for three weeks took advantage of the brief lull to escape.
Israel had said, in announcing the halt to air strikes earlier Monday, that it would suspend that pledge to end air strikes for 48 hours depending on ''operational developments'' in Lebanon. After Hezbollah guerrillas hit an Israeli tank near Taibeh with an anti-tank missile, Israel said it carried out the air strikes to protect its ground troops.
AP Television footage showed two Israeli tanks side by side in southern Lebanon, with flames suddenly covering one of them. Soldiers soon emerged from one tank and did not appear to be badly hurt.
In a second airstrike around the port city of Tyre, Israel accidentally killed a Lebanese soldier when it hit a car that it believed was carrying a senior Hezbollah official, the Israeli army said. Lebanese security officials said the soldier was killed by a rocket strike from a pilotless drone aircraft.
The Israeli army justified the action, saying the leader believed to have been in the car was a threat to Israel. Instead, the car was carrying a Lebanese army officer and soldiers. ...
A Night of Death and Terror for Lebanese Villagers - New York Times: "By SABRINA TAVERNISE | Published: July 31, 2006
QANA, Lebanon, July 30 — The dead lay in strange shapes. Several had open mouths filled with dirt. Faces were puffy. A man’s arm was extended straight out from his body, his fingers spread. Two tiny children, a girl and boy, lay feet to head in the back of an ambulance, their skin like wax.
...
This was the single most lethal episode in the course of this sudden war. The survivors will remember it as the day their children died. For the village, it is a fresh pain in a wound cut more than 10 years ago, when an Israeli attack here killed more than 100 civilians. Many of them were children, too.
The Israeli government apologized for that airstrike, as it did for the one here on Sunday. It said that residents had been warned to leave and should have already been gone.
But leaving southern Lebanon now is dangerous. The two extended families staying in the house that the Israeli missile struck — the Shalhoubs and the Hashims — had discussed leaving several times over the past two weeks. But they were poor — most worked in tobacco or construction — and the families were big and many of their members weak, with a 95-year-old, two relatives in wheelchairs and dozens of children. A taxi north, around $1,000, was unaffordable.
And then there was the risk of the road itself. ...
My Way News - 34 Youths Among 56 Dead in Israeli Strike: "Jul 30, 10:29 AM (ET) | By KATHY GANNON
QANA, Lebanon (AP) - Israeli missiles hit several buildings in a southern Lebanon village as people slept Sunday, killing at least 56, most of them children, in the deadliest attack in 19 days of fighting. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert expressed "great sorrow" for the airstrikes but blamed Hezbollah guerrillas for using the area to launch rockets at Israel, and said he would not halt the army's operation.
The Lebanese Red Cross said the airstrike in Qana, in which at least 34 children were killed, pushed the overall Lebanese death toll to more than 500. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice postponed a visit to Lebanon in a setback for diplomatic efforts to end hostilities. She was to return to the U.S. Monday morning, abruptly breaking off her diplomatic mission in the Mideast.
Before the airstrike, Olmert told Rice he needed 10-14 days to finish the offensive in Lebanon, according to a senior Israeli government official. The two said they would meet again Sunday evening.
"We will not stop this battle, despite the difficult incidents this morning," Olmert said said during Israel's weekly Cabinet meeting, according to a participant in the meeting. "We will continue the activity and if necessary it will be broadened without hesitation." ...
BBC NEWS | Middle East | Analysis: A second Qana Massacre?: "By Martin Asser | BBC News, Beirut
The southern Lebanese town of Qana is known for two events in history, and there could soon be a third after Sunday's Israeli air strike left over 50 dead, many of them children.
In realms of biblical narrative, some believe it to be the scene of Jesus Christ's first miracle, turning water into wine during the wedding at Cana of Galilee.
In modern times, it was the scene of one of the bloodiest events of the modern Arab-Israeli conflict, the Israeli shelling of a UN base sheltering Lebanese civilians 10 years ago.
International shock at those 1996 deaths - more than 100, and another 100 injured - led to huge pressure for a ceasefire deal bringing an end to Israel's last sustained military operation against Hezbollah militants, codenamed Operation Grapes of Wrath. ...
Maan News Agency: "Israeli sniper kills a 13-year-old boy in Jabalia refugee camp, northern Gaza | Date: 28 / 07 / 2006 Time: 13:08
Gaza- Ma'an- A 13-year-old Palestinian boy was killed on Friday by an Israeli sniper's bullet, reported the Ma'an correspondent in Gaza.
An Israeli sniper shot and killed Anas Zomlot, from the 'Block 2' area in Jabalia refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip, early on Friday morning as he was standing on his family's balcony.
The boy was transferred to Ash Shifa'a Hospital in Gaza City but he died just moments after arriving, said Dr. Bakr Abu Safiyeh.
Meanwhile, Israeli warplanes carried out three air strikes early on Friday morning on various targets, including a Palestinian house in Khan Younis refugee camp in the south of the Gaza Strip.
Two Israeli missiles struck the house, injuring five Palestinians, reported the Ma'an correspondent. The house also caught fire and much of the house was destroyed."
Excite News: "Israel kills 5 in Gaza, gunman in Jerusalem | Jul 27, 6:25 PM (ET) | By Nidal al-Mughrabi
GAZA (Reuters) - Israeli forces targeting gunmen killed five civilians in Gaza on Thursday, Palestinian medical workers said, while police at a checkpoint in south Jerusalem killed a Palestinian who shot at them.
Israel's month-long offensive into the Gaza Strip to recover a captured soldier and end cross-border rocket attacks has largely been overshadowed by fighting against Hizbollah guerrillas in Lebanon, but shows no sign of slackening.
Those who died on Thursday included a 75-year-old woman, whose house was hit by a missile or shell. Medical workers said two civilians, aged 16 and 23, were killed in an air strike.
Among other casualties, a 12-year-old boy was killed by a bullet that witnesses said was fired by an Israeli tank near the town of Jabalya in northern Gaza. ...
Excite News: "Israeli bombs kill 11 in Lebanon | Jul 28, 5:06 AM (ET) | By Lin Noueihed
BEIRUT (Reuters) - Israel battered Lebanon on Friday, killing 11 people as waves of air raids struck villages in the hills behind the southern port of Tyre and hundreds of artillery rounds crashed across the border.
Security sources said at least eight people, including a Jordanian, died in over 40 air raids in the south. Three were killed in overnight air strikes in the eastern Bekaa Valley.
Despite growing world demands for an end to Israel's war with Hizbollah guerrillas, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice delayed a possible return to the region
The pounding of villages, where some civilians remain trapped, followed a decision by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's security cabinet to intensify air strikes and ground forays against Hizbollah, rather than launching a big invasion.Rice is likely to delay her departure from Malaysia until Saturday, said a senior State Department official, dashing prospects that she would return to the Middle East on Friday.
"She will go when it is the right time," the official said. "She will go when it is useful." ...
The Register-Guard, Eugene, Oregon, USA: "Dozens killed in day of fiercest combat yet | By Craig Smith and Helene Cooper | Published: Thursday, July 27, 2006
AVIVIM, Israel - Israel's two-front conflict saw its heaviest day of fighting on Wednesday, killing nine Israeli soldiers, dozens of Hezbollah fighters and at least 23 Palestinians in Gaza. As the battles raged, a meeting of the United States and European and Arab countries in Rome failed to reach agreement on a plan to end the fighting between Israel and Hezbollah as the United States resisted calls for an immediate cease-fire.
Hezbollah kept up its sustained fire on northern Israel, with 151 rockets hitting the region, wounding at least 31 Israelis.
The death toll has been at least 433 in Lebanon and 51 in Israel, according to Reuters.
The death toll on Wednesday was Israel's highest since fighting began on July 12. The most intense ground combat came around Bint Jbail, a Hezbollah stronghold a few miles from the Israeli border. An Israeli military official said at least 30 Hezbollah guerrillas were killed." ...
US blocks UN from condemning Israel | Jerusalem Post: "By ASSOCIATED PRESS | JPost.com » International » Article
Jul. 27, 2006 3:52 | Updated Jul. 27, 2006 9:43
The United States blocked the UN Security Council on Wednesday from issuing a statement that would have condemned Israel's bombing of a UN post on the Lebanon border that killed four military observers overnight Tuesday.
US diplomats refused to comment, and US Ambassador John Bolton was in Washington preparing for a new confirmation hearing before the Senate; however, several diplomats said the United States objected to one paragraph, which said the council "condemns any deliberate attack against UN personnel and emphasizes that such attacks are unacceptable.
Earlier Wednesday, UN officials said that the UN observers in Lebanon had telephoned the IDF 10 times in six hours to ask it to stop shelling near their position.
Jane Lute, assistant secretary-general for peacekeeping, told the UN Security Council in New York that the UN observation post near Khiam came under close IDF fire 21 times Tuesday - including 12 hits within 100 yards and five direct hits - until the peacekeepers' post was destroyed.
US blocks UN from condemning Israel | Jerusalem Post: "By ASSOCIATED PRESS
JPost.com » International » Article
Jul. 27, 2006 3:52 | Updated Jul. 27, 2006 9:43
US blocks UN from condemning Israel
By ASSOCIATED PRESS
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The United States blocked the UN Security Council on Wednesday from issuing a statement that would have condemned Israel's bombing of a UN post on the Lebanon border that killed four military observers overnight Tuesday.
US diplomats refused to comment, and US Ambassador John Bolton was in Washington preparing for a new confirmation hearing before the Senate; however, several diplomats said the United States objected to one paragraph, which said the council "condemns any deliberate attack against UN personnel and emphasizes that such attacks are unacceptable."
Middle East Online: "Mysterious wounds from Israeli shells in Gaza | By Jennie Matthew - GAZA CITY
Palestinians accuse Israel of using new bombs that cause burn injuries never seen before.
'When the bomb exploded from the plane. I felt I was in hell. Real hell,' shouts 31-year-old Ghassan stabbing the air with his finger and straining over the side of his grubby hospital bed.
Professing allegiance to Palestinian national security but parroting ideology atune to armed factions, Ghassan went to Gaza's Maghazi refugee camp last week to fight the Israelis during a particularly bloody incursion.
'I feel chemicals. I feel high heat, I feel high pain,' he elaborates in English, both legs heavily bandaged, as patients and visitors brush past in a crowded corridor of Gaza's Al-Shifa hospital.
'They found shrapnel with 'test' written on it,' he shouts.
Accusations abound that the Israelis, pressing a nearly five-week offensive in which 130 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, are using a new weapon.
Doctors say they have never before seen such specific burn injuries, concentrated so much on the lower body and causing such a high propensity of amputations. The health ministry has already called for an independent inquiry.
A French humanitarian group reported unusually severe injuries. One of its doctors reportedly raised the possibility that Israel used cluster bombs." ...
Asia Times Online :: Middle East News, Iraq, Iran current affairs: " Israel's star-spangled arsenal | By Frida Berrigan and William D Hartung
Much has been made in the US media of the Syrian- and Iranian-origin weaponry used by Hezbollah in the escalating violence in Israel and Lebanon. There has been no parallel discussion of the origin of Israel's weaponry, the vast bulk of which is from the United States.
The US is the primary source of Israel's far superior arsenal. For more than 30 years, Israel had been the largest recipient of US foreign assistance, and since 1985 Jerusalem has received about US$3 billion in military and economic aid each year from Washington. US aid accounts for more than 20% of Israel's total defense budget.
Over the past decade, the US has transferred more than $17 billion in military aid to this country of just under 7 million people.
Israel is one of the United States' largest arms importers. Between 1996 and 2005 (the last year for which full data are available), Israel took delivery of $10.19 billion in US weaponry and military equipment, including more than $8.58 billion through the Foreign Military Sales Program, and another $1.61 billion in direct commercial sales.
During the administration of US President George W Bush, from 2001 to 2005, Israel received $10.5 billion in foreign military financing - the Pentagon's biggest military aid program - and $6.3 billion in US arms deliveries. The aid figure is larger than the arms-transfer figure because it includes financing for major arms agreements for which the equipment has yet to be fully delivered. The most prominent of these deals is a $4.5 billion sale of 102 Lockheed Martin F-16s to Israel. ...
Reuters AlertNet - Oil spill adds ecological crisis to Lebanon's agony: "27 Jul 2006 17:07:14 GMT
By Lin Noueihed BEIRUT, July 27 (Reuters) - Along Lebanon's sandy beaches and rocky headlands runs a belt of black sludge, 10,000 to 30,000 tonnes of oil that spilled into the Mediterranean Sea after Israel bombed a power plant.
Lebanon's Environment Ministry says the oil flooded into the sea when Israeli jets hit storage tanks at the Jiyyeh plant south of Beirut on July 13 and 15, creating an ecological crisis that Lebanon's government has neither the money nor the expertise to deal with. "
We have never seen a spill like this in the history of Lebanon. It is a major catastrophe," Environment Minister Yacoub al-Sarraf told Reuters. "The equipment we have is for minor spills. We use it once in a blue moon to clean a small spill of 50 tonnes or so. To clean this whole thing up we would need an armada ... The cost of a full clean-up could run as high as $40-50 million."
The spill is especially threatening since fish spawn and sea turtles nest on Lebanon's coast, including the green turtle which is endangered in the Mediterranean, local ecologists say. ...
Reuters AlertNet - Lebanon president says Israel uses phosphorous arms: "24 Jul 2006 14:16:57 GMT
PARIS, July 24 (Reuters) - Lebanon's president accused Israel on Monday of using phosphorous bombs in its 13-day offensive and urged the United Nations to demand an immediate ceasefire.
"According to the Geneva Convention, when they use phosphorous bombs and laser bombs, is that allowed against civilians and children?" President Emile Lahoud asked on France's RFI radio.
An Israeli military spokeswoman said arms used in Lebanon did not contravene international norms. ...
Khaleej Times Online - Israel warns it will hit 10 buildings for every rocket fired: "(AFP) | 24 July 2006
JERUSALEM - The Israeli air force is under orders to blast 10 buildings in south Beirut, a Hezbollah stronghold, for every rocket the Shiite militant group fires at the Israeli port of Haifa, army radio said Monday.
“Army chief of staff Dan Halutz has given the order to the air force to destroy 10 multi-storey buildings in the Dahaya district (of Beirut) in response to every rocket fired on Haifa,” a senior air force officer told the station." ...
International Middle East Media Center - Seven Palestinians, including two children, killed in the Gaza Strip on Monday: "Saed Bannoura - IMEMC & Agencies - Tuesday, 25 July 2006, 01:44
Monday evening, a 5-year old child was killed and three members of her family were injured in Beit Lahia in the northern part of the Gaza Strip. In a separate incident, a child and his grandmother were killed; three residents were injured in the northern part of the Gaza Strip. ...
Bombings Hit Children Hardest: "Bombings Hit Children Hardest | By Dahr Jamail
BEIRUT - About 55 percent of all casualties at the Beirut Government University Hospital are children of 15 years of age or less, hospital records show.
'This is worse than during the Lebanese civil war,' Bilal Masri, assistant director of the hospital, one of Beirut's largest, told IPS Monday.
Not only are most of the patients children, but many of the injured have been brought in serious condition, he said. 'Now we have a 30 percent fatality rate here in Beirut. That means that 30 percent of everyone hit by Israeli bombs are dying. It is a catastrophe.'
The fatality rate was high, he said, 'because the Israelis are using new kinds of bombs which can enter shelters. They are bombing the bomb shelters which are full of refugees.' ..."
CNN.com - U.N.: Israeli airstrike hits U.N. observer post - Jul 25, 2006: "Tuesday, July 25, 2006; Posted: 8:24 p.m. EDT (00:24 GMT)"
Sources: Condoleezza Rice floats plan to end conflict
BEIRUT, Lebanon (CNN) -- An Israeli airstrike hit a United Nations post in southern Lebanon late Tuesday, killing at least two of the agency's observers, according to the U.N. Interim Force in Lebanon.
The U.N. initially reported that four peacekeepers were dead, but later said there were two dead and two missing.
Lebanese security sources said the two missing observers are feared buried in the rubble of the building....
UNIFIL said there had been at least 14 incidents of fire close to the post since Tuesday afternoon.
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said he was "deeply distressed" by the "apparently deliberate" strike.
"This coordinated artillery and aerial attack on a long-established and clearly marked U.N. post at Khiyam occurred despite personal assurances given to me by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert that U.N. positions would be spared Israeli fire," he said in a statement.
"Furthermore, General Alain Pelligrini, the U.N. force commander in south Lebanon, had been in repeated contact with Israeli officers throughout the day on Tuesday, stressing the need to protect that particular U.N. position from attack."
Ayalon called Annan's statement "outrageous," while Israel's U.N. ambassador, Dan Gillerman, said he, too, was "deeply distressed" that Annan alleged that the strike was deliberate.
Excite News - Israeli Raid in Gaza Kills Palestinian Boy: "Jul 25, 9:23 PM (ET) | By IBRAHIM BARZAK
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip (AP) - Israeli troops conducting an operation near the town of Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip on Tuesday shot and killed a Palestinian boy and wounded his father and sister, Palestinian hospital and security officials said.
The army denied any involvement and said no Israeli forces were operating in the Khan Younis area. It said the only shooting incident was near the Kissufim crossing, three miles away, when troops fired at a group of people after they set off an explosive device next to the border. However, they did not hit them, the army said.
Hospital officials said the 12-year old boy, his 16-year-old sister and their father were shot after they stumbled on an undercover army unit. ...
Civilian vehicles attacked by Israel on road to safety - World - Times Online: "July 24, 2006 | By Nicholas Blanford in Tyre and Ned Parker in Jerusalem "
Fleeing civilian vehicles hit by Israeli missiles ... in the roof of the crumpled bus, created by a missile fired minutes earlier by an Israeli helicopter that had blasted the vehicle off the road. Left behind in the vehicle, slumped over each other and soaked in blood, were the bodies of three people.
...
But the evidence yesterday suggested that cars were being attacked Publish Post regardless of their occupants and direction of travel. ...
Civilian Toll Mounts in Lebanon Conflict: "By Anthony Shadid | Washington Post Foreign Service | Monday, July 24, 2006; Page A01"
At Hospitals in Tyre, Cries Go Up Among Wounded for Slain Loved Ones
...
Israeli forces repeatedly struck cars on southern Lebanon's already perilous roads in attacks that victims said were indiscriminate. Seven people were killed, three of them when an Israeli helicopter fired a missile at a white minibus carrying 19 people fleeing the village of Tairi, which Israeli forces had ordered residents to evacuate. The missile tore through the roof of the vehicle as it sped around a bend in the road. Layal Najib, a 23-year-old photographer for the Lebanese magazine al-Jaras, was killed when Israeli forces struck near her taxi outside the town of Qana to the northwest. She was the first journalist killed in the 12-day conflict.
"Are there any armed men here? Is there any resistance here?" asked Ali Najm, a physician helping to treat the injured in Tyre. He surveyed the wounded, struggling to maintain the detachment of a medical professional and suppress the anger of a neighbor watching a war that he said he did not understand. "There is no aim to this," he said. "They are innocent people. They are carrying white flags, and they're trying to escape."
The day's events began at 10:30 a.m. when the Mercedes of Mahmoud's family was struck as it barreled down a coastal road dotted by palm trees and banana plantations. As it burned, Zein al-Abdin Zabit passed in his white Nissan with his wife and four sons. His drive was already frantic: Along the road from Naqoura, he had picked up someone wounded in Qlaile, trying to take him to the hospital. A few more miles, then he reached Maaliye, where he picked up two men wounded as they rode a motorcycle.
Near the hospital, a missile struck behind his car, and it caught fire. He floored it for 200 yards more, feeding the flames as he tried to make it to the hospital. Near its entrance, he crashed into a curb, and his ribs were broken. He and the others clambered out, and the gasoline tank exploded. ......
The Shaitas said the car was speeding out of the village at midmorning. The boys' uncle was carrying a white flag with his hand, as was another passenger. Soon after they were hit, a Red Cross ambulance arrived, the crew worried about roads they deemed too risky.
Excite News: "Israeli shell kills two in Gaza: witnesses | Jul 24, 7:29 AM (ET)
GAZA (Reuters) - An Israeli shell landed near a crowd of people in the northern Gaza Strip on Monday, killing at least two people, Palestinian witnesses said.
An Israeli army spokeswoman said she was checking the report. Residents said a tank shell hit a crowd of people standing near an apartment building in the northern part of Beit Lahiya, near the Gaza-Israel border. Two people were killed in the explosion and several others were wounded, Palestinian medics."
Earlier on Monday, the Israeli army said Palestinian militants in the northern Gaza Strip fired at least six rockets into Israel, two of them landed near the coastal city of Ashkelon. Nobody was hurt in those attacks.
[i.e Israelis are sure about the shells that don't kill, but don't know about the shells that do kill. ed.]
Excite News - Israeli Warplanes Blast Minibus, Killing 3: "By SAM F. GHATTAS
BEIRUT, Lebanon (AP) - Israeli warplanes Sunday hit a minibus carrying Lebanese fleeing border villages, killing three and wounding 13, Lebanese security forces said. Hezbollah guerrilas fired rockets into northern Israel, killing at least two people. ...
Excite News: "Civilians bear brunt in Mideast | Jul 23, 3:15 PM (ET)
By Tom Perry
BEIRUT (Reuters) - Israeli warplanes pounded Lebanon and Hizbollah rockets crashed into Haifa on Sunday as a senior U.N. official demanded a halt to the violence to allow aid to reach desperate civilians.
Civilians have taken the brunt of the 12-day war that has cost 368 lives in Lebanon and killed 37 Israelis.
"We have been living in hell," Lebanese farmer Mohammad Zabad, 45, told Reuters in the southern port of Tyre. ...
BBC NEWS | Politics | Minister condemns Israeli action: "Foreign Office minister Kim Howells has criticised Israel's bombardment of Lebanon, while on a visit to Beirut.
He said Israel had not carried out "surgical strikes" and attacking the Lebanese nation was not the answer.
Downing Street said the prime minister would stand by Mr Howell's comments, adding the British government had "always urged restraint on Israel".
Meanwhile thousands of people across the UK are joining demonstrations against Israeli attacks on Lebanon.
Speaking in Beirut, Mr Howells said: "I very much hope that the Americans understand what's happening to Lebanon.
"The destruction of the infrastructure, the death of so many children and so many people. These have not been surgical strikes.
"And it's very difficult, I think, to understand the kind of military tactics that have been used.
"You know, if they're chasing Hezbollah, then go for Hezbollah. You don't go for the entire Lebanese nation." ...
Excite News - Israeli Strike Kills 11 Lebanese Soldiers: "Jul 18, 8:28 AM (ET) | By SAM F. GHATTAS
...
The base in the southern area of Kfar Chima took a direct hit as the soldiers rushed to their bomb shelters, leaving at least 11 soldiers dead and 35 wounded, the Lebanese military said.
The Lebanese army has largely stayed out of the fighting, but its positions have been repeatedly attacked by Israeli warplanes, undermining Israel's call for it to help push back Hezbollah from the border. ...
BBC NEWS | Middle East | UN appalled by Beirut devastation:
The UN's Jan Egeland has condemned the devastation caused by Israeli air strikes in Beirut, saying it is a violation of humanitarian law.
Mr Egeland, the UN's emergency relief chief, described the destruction as "horrific" as he toured the city
...
A visibly moved Mr Egeland expressed shock that "block after block" of buildings had been levelled. ...
Hezbollah captures two Israeli soldiers : HindustanTimes.com: "Hezbollah captures two Israeli soldiers | Indo-Asian News Service | Beirut, July 12, 2006
The Lebanese Shiite Hezbollah movement announced on Wednesday that its guerrillas have captured two Israeli soldiers in southern Lebanon.
"Implementing our promise to free Arab prisoners in Israeli jails, our strugglers have captured two Israeli soldiers in southern Lebanon," a statement by Hezbollah said.
"The two soldiers have already been moved to a safe place," it added.
The Lebanese police said that the two soldiers were captured as they "infiltrated" into the town of Aitaa al-Chaab inside the Lebanese border.
Israeli aircraft were active in the air over southern Lebanon, the police said, with jets bombing roads leading to the market town of Nabatiyeh, 60 kms south of Beirut. ...
U.S. Speeds Up Bomb Delivery for the Israelis - New York Times: "By DAVID S. CLOUD and HELENE COOPER
Published: July 22, 2006
WASHINGTON, July 21 — The Bush administration is rushing a delivery of precision-guided bombs to Israel, which requested the expedited shipment last week after beginning its air campaign against Hezbollah targets in Lebanon, American officials said Friday.
The decision to quickly ship the weapons to Israel was made with relatively little debate within the Bush administration, the officials said. Its disclosure threatens to anger Arab governments and others because of the appearance that the United States is actively aiding the Israeli bombing campaign in a way that could be compared to Iran’s efforts to arm and resupply Hezbollah.
The munitions that the United States is sending to Israel are part of a multimillion-dollar arms sale package approved last year that Israel is able to draw on as needed, the officials said. But Israel’s request for expedited delivery of the satellite and laser-guided bombs was described as unusual by some military officers, and as an indication that Israel still had a long list of targets in Lebanon to strike. ...
Irish Examiner> Breaking News> Sport: "20/07/2006 - 9:54:00 AM
Third of Lebanon casualties are children, says UN
Nearly one third of all casualties in the Lebanon-Israel conflict have been children, according to the United Nations’ emergency relief co-ordinator, Jan Egeland.
He said it appeared neither Hezbollah nor the Israelis seemed to care about civilian suffering.
Nearly a third of the dead or wounded were children and the wounded could not be helped because roads and bridges had been cut by Israeli air strikes.
"
Excite News: "Israel pounds Lebanon, civilians fear worse to come | Jul 19, 8:59 PM (ET) | By Alaa Shahine
BEIRUT (Reuters) - Israeli warplanes pounded Lebanon on Thursday and frightened civilians feared the bombing would get worse once thousands of foreign nationals complete their evacuation from the stricken Arab country.
Dozens of aircraft dropped 23 tonnes of explosives on a building in Beirut's southern suburbs where the army said it suspected senior Hizbollah leaders were holed up. The guerrilla group, however, denied any of its leaders or members were killed during the raid which it said hit a mosque under construction.
Sixty-three Lebanese civilians were killed in air strikes on Wednesday, the deadliest toll in the nine-day war triggered in retaliation to Hizbollah's July 12 capture of two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border operation.
Hizbollah rockets killed two children in the northern Israeli city of Nazareth, medics said. More rockets fell on the city of Haifa and one hit an empty seafront restaurant.
And despite international concern, there was no sign Israel or its Lebanese Shi'ite foes were ready to heed the Beirut government's pleas for an immediate halt to a war that has killed at least 299 people in Lebanon and 29 in Israel.
"I have a very bad feeling that after the foreigners flee the bombings will get worse," said 37-year old Ziad Nayef, a costume designer. "Nobody cares about Arab lives."
...
Israel's offensive in Lebanon has coincided with a three-week-old push into the Gaza Strip to retrieve another soldier, seized by Palestinian militants on June 25.
Israeli troops killed 10 Palestinians in clashes in Gaza -- five militants and five civilians -- and another five were killed in the occupied West Bank. About 60 Palestinians, including 10 children, were wounded, medics said. ...
Excite News: "Israeli troops kill 9 Palestinians in Gaza, West Bank | Jul 19, 7:20 AM (ET) | by Nidal al-Mughrabi
GAZA (Reuters) - Israeli troops killed nine Palestinians in clashes in the Gaza Strip and occupied West Bank on Wednesday, including four gunmen and two civilians as tanks pushed into a central Gaza refugee camp.
The two civilians killed included a 16-year-old.
Fifty-two Palestinians were wounded in the Gaza clashes, including four hurt by a missile fired from an Israeli drone aircraft. At least 10 of those hurt were children. Some of the wounded were in a critical condition, medics said. ...
Excite News: "Israeli air raids kill 50 | Jul 19, 7:37 AM (ET) | By Lin Noueihed
BEIRUT (Reuters) - Israel unleashed fierce air strikes on Lebanon on Wednesday, killing 49 civilians and a Hizbollah fighter, as thousands of villagers fled north and more foreigners were evacuated to escape the eight-day-old war.
Israeli troops crossed the border to raid Hizbollah posts and Dubai-based Al Arabiya TV said two soldiers had been killed and two wounded in clashes with the Shi'ite Muslim guerrillas." ...
With Israeli Use of Force, Debate Over Proportion - New York Times: "By STEVEN ERLANGER | Published: July 19, 2006
JERUSALEM, July 18 — The asymmetry in the reported death tolls is marked and growing: some 230 Lebanese dead, most of them civilians, to 25 Israeli dead, 13 of them civilians. In Gaza, one Israel soldier has died from his own army’s fire, and 103 Palestinians have been killed, 70 percent of them militants.
The cold figures, combined with Israeli air attacks on civilian infrastructure like power plants, electricity transformers, airports, bridges, highways and government buildings, have led to accusations by France and the European Union, echoed by some nongovernmental organizations, that Israel is guilty of “disproportionate use of force” in the Gaza Strip and Lebanon and of “collective punishment” of the civilian populations.
...
“When you go to sleep with a missile,” she said, “you might find yourself waking up to another kind of missile.”
Those arguments leave Lebanese and Gazans cold.
Dalia Harati, 33, a Lebanese Sunni in Beirut, said: “The world is just standing by while Israel kills more and more. They come here and urge Hezbollah to free the prisoners and then stop firing rockets against Israel, with only about 30 killed so far, and then ask the Israelis to stop their attacks when they have already killed more than 200.
“It is as usual the West’s famous double standards, but we were hoping that would change when so many innocents are being killed.” ...
Israeli Planes Batter Lebanon Again, Killing 30 People - New York Times: "BEIRUT, Lebanon, July 18 —
Israeli warplanes continued to batter targets in Lebanon today, killing 30 people, including 11 members of the Lebanese Army when bombs hit their barracks east of Beirut. Four of the dead were officers, and 30 more soldiers were wounded.
...
In southern Lebanon, nine members of a single family were killed and four wounded in an Israeli airstrike on their house in the village of Aitaroun, near the Israeli border.
According to the United Nations, about 500,000 Lebanese are thought to have left their homes in southern Beirut and southern Lebanon to escape the violence.
The Lebanese prime minister, Fouad Siniora, criticized the world for not stopping the Israeli offensive. “The international community is not doing all that is can in order to stop Israel continuing its aggression against Lebanon,” Mr. Siniora said in an interview in his Beirut office. “They are stopping short of exercising the necessary pressure on Israel while Israel is taking this as a green light.”
He also accused Israel of “committing massacres against Lebanese civilians and working to destroy everything that allows Lebanon to stay alive.” ...
CANOE -- CNEWS - Canada: 8 Cdns killed in Israeli airstrike: "
Cdn deaths cast pall over G8 success for HarperHezbollah leader denies Iran linkMerkel: G8 leaders agree on Mideast violence statementIsrael batters Lebanese seaports, roadsBEIRUT (CP) - Eight Canadians were killed and six other Canadians critically injured after an Israeli air raid on a Lebanese town on the border with Israel, Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay said Sunday.
Lebanese officials said the Canadians were killed at their home in the town of Aitaroun, which abuts the border.
The victims have not been not identified.
Media reports said the victims were a family that had come from Canada to spend the summer holidays in the town. ...
Aljazeera.Net - Israeli offensive kills 23 in Gaza: "Wednesday 12 July 2006, 20:46 Makka Time, 17:46 GMT
Twenty-three people, including nine members of the same family, have been killed as Israeli tanks and troops pushed into the central Gaza Strip.
: "IOF Bomb a House in the Sheikh Radwan Quarter, Killing a Palestinian, his Wife, and 7 Children; 34 Civilians were Injured
“My name is Jihad Mohammad El-Saloul. I’m 49 years old, and work as a teachers. I’m a neighbor of Dr. Nabil Abu Salmeya.
Tonight at approximately 2:45 in the morning, I heard a small explosion. My wife, our children, and I woke up. I thought it was a sound bomb. My children were standing near the window. After about 10 minutes I heard a second explosion. The glass fell over our heads. I got out of the house to see what happened. One of our neighbors is Ahmad Bahar “Abu Akram,” a political leader in Hamas. I thought the explosion was in his home. As I walked, I was surprised that the explosion was in Dr. Nabil Abu Salmeya’s house. I went towards the bombed house. Smoke and thick dust was issuing from the house. I saw an injured, bearded man among the rubble (El-Ja’bari). We put him in a blue Fiat with 3 young men from among the neighbors. After that, I went to help save others.
We found Abu Salmeya’s son Ahmad, who studies engineering at university. He was injured in the face. He was in pain, and was standing on the balcony of the bombed house. He was calling us. We took him to an ambulance.
After that I saw a girl, Abu Salmeya’s daughter, who was about 17. She was handicapped. Her body was thrown on the ground, between the trees in the garden.
Then we found the body of his son, Yehya, who is in fourth grade. It was a headless body. We found the head in the hallway of a neighbor’s house, from Abass family. I knew Yehya and the girl well.
Then I found another son. He was dead and on the ground." ...
Excite News - Hezbollah Rockets Hit Haifa, Killing 8: "Hezbollah Rockets Hit Haifa, Killing 8 | Jul 16, 8:01 AM (ET) | By JOSEF FEDERMAN
HAIFA, Israel (AP) - Lebanese guerillas fired a relentless barrage of rockets into the northern Israeli city of Haifa on Sunday, killing eight people at a train station and wounding seven others in a dramatic escalation of a five-day-old conflict that has shattered Mideast peace.
Soon after the Haifa attack, Israeli airstrikes reduced entire apartment buildings to rubble and knocked out electricity in swaths of the Lebanese capital Sunday. ...
The Observer | World | Children die in convoy attack as Israel widens Lebanon assault: "Inigo Gilmore in Nahariyah, Patrick Wintour in St Petersburg and Tracy McVeigh | Sunday July 16, 2006 | The Observer
Israel steeply escalated its military campaign against Hizbollah in Lebanon yesterday with a series of air strikes that left more than 35 civilians dead, including a single strike on a convoy of families fleeing the fighting in a village near Tyre in the south of the country that killed more than 20 people, most of them children.
The intensification of the conflict, in which Hizbollah fired missiles deep intoIsrael, came as international leaders appeared to be deeply split over how to respond to a crisis that threatens to spill over into a full-scale war involving Syria and Iran as well as Israel, Palestine and Lebanon. Last night the Lebanese Prime Minister, Fouad Siniora, declared the country in a 'state of catastrophe'."
According to witnesses and photographs from the scene of the worst incident, an Israeli missile incinerated a car and a small truck full of families leaving their Lebanese border village of Marwaheen near Tyre after the Israeli army used loudhailers to tell residents they had just hours to go. Pictures showed charred bodies of children strewn across the road.
UN peacekeepers recovered the bodies. Half the passengers were children or teenagers, according to medical sources. It was the deadliest single strike since Israel started an air campaign against Lebanon after two of its soldiers were captured by Hizbollah on Wednesday.
BBC NEWS | Middle East | Israel kills Lebanese civilians: "An Israeli air raid has killed at least 17 Lebanese civilians who were fleeing southern border areas.
Women and children were among those killed when the convoy was hit. "Bodies litter the road," an eyewitness said.
Israel has expanded its campaign launched after Hezbollah militants seized two Israeli soldiers. More than 70 Lebanese have been killed.
Hezbollah has responded with rockets. Several have hit the town of Tiberias in the deepest such attack in Israel. ...
Excite News: "Israel kills 34 civilians in strikes | Jul 15, 3:40 PM (ET) | By Laila Bassam
BEIRUT (Reuters) - Israel killed at least 34 civilians on Saturday, including 15 children, in air strikes meant to punish Lebanon for letting Hizbollah guerrillas menace the Jewish state's northern border.
Israel's bombing of Lebanese roads, bridges, ports and airports, as well as Hizbollah targets, is its most destructive onslaught since a 1982 invasion to expel Palestinian forces.
For the first time, ports in Christian areas were bombarded and a helicopter missile hit a lighthouse on Beirut's seafront.
Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora demanded an immediate U.N.-backed ceasefire, denouncing Israel for turning his country into a "disaster zone." He appealed for foreign aid.
An Israeli missile incinerated a van in southern Lebanon, killing 20 people, among them 15 children, in the deadliest single attack of the campaign launched by Israel after Hizbollah captured two of its soldiers and killed eight on Wednesday.
Police said the van was carrying two families fleeing the village of Marwaheen after Israeli loudspeaker warnings to leave their homes. Many of the bodies were charred and broken.
Other raids on north, east and south Lebanon killed 14 people and wounded 37, security sources said.
At least 103 people, all but four of them civilians, have been killed in Israel's four-day-old assault, which has choked Lebanon's economy and prompted tourists and foreigners to flee.
Excite News: "Israel kills 34 civilians in strikes | Jul 15, 3:40 PM (ET) | By Laila Bassam
BEIRUT (Reuters) - Israel killed at least 34 civilians on Saturday, including 15 children, in air strikes meant to punish Lebanon for letting Hizbollah guerrillas menace the Jewish state's northern border.
Israel's bombing of Lebanese roads, bridges, ports and airports, as well as Hizbollah targets, is its most destructive onslaught since a 1982 invasion to expel Palestinian forces.
For the first time, ports in Christian areas were bombarded and a helicopter missile hit a lighthouse on Beirut's seafront.
 |
An Israeli missile incinerated a van in southern Lebanon, killing 20 people, among them 15 children, in the deadliest single attack of the campaign launched by Israel after Hizbollah captured two of its soldiers and killed eight on Wednesday.
Police said the van was carrying two families fleeing the village of Marwaheen after Israeli loudspeaker warnings to leave their homes. Many of the bodies were charred and broken.
Other raids on north, east and south Lebanon killed 14 people and wounded 37, security sources said.
At least 103 people, all but four of them civilians, have been killed in Israel's four-day-old assault, which has choked Lebanon's economy and prompted tourists and foreigners to flee. ...
Independent Online Edition > Robert Fisk: "Robert Fisk: From my home, I saw what the 'war on terror' meant | Published: 14 July 2006
All night I heard the jets, whispering high above the Mediterranean. It lasted for hours, little fireflies that were watching Beirut, waiting for dawn perhaps, because it was then that they descended.
They came first to the little village of Dweir near Nabatiya in southern Lebanon where an Israeli plane dropped a bomb on to the home of a Shia Muslim cleric. He was killed. So was his wife. So were eight of his children. One was decapitated. All they could find of a baby was its head and torso which a young villager brandished in fury in front of the cameras. Then the planes visited another home in Dweir and disposed of a family of seven."
Independent Online Edition > Middle East: "13 July 2006 22:29 | Israel widens bombing campaign as Lebanese militia groups retaliate | By Donald Macintyre in Nahariya and Eric Silver in Jerusalem | Published: 14 July 2006
Israeli forces blockaded Lebanese ports and bombed runways at Beirut airport yesterday in a series of fierce reprisal attacks that Lebanese officials say have killed 55 civilians.
...
The Israeli military said Hizbollah guerrillas fired more than 100 Katyusha rockets in retaliation at towns and villages across the north of Israel, killing two women in what was the most serious barrage since the mid-1990s. One woman was killed in Nahariya and another woman died from her wounds in Safed.
The Truth Will Set You Free: Israelis bomb crowded Gaza beach, kills children: "Israelis bomb crowded Gaza beach, kills children
Even children playing on a beach are open game for Israelis. Unbelievable.
Israeli air strikes and artillery fire killed 10 Palestinians on Friday, including seven people on a crowded Gaza beach, the highest Palestinian death toll in a single day since December 2004, Palestinian officials said.
Among those killed on the beach were three children, including an infant, a 3-year-old and a 10-year-old, who were playing at the time, witnesses said.
About 20 people were injured by the shelling, which Palestinian sources said came from Israeli ships. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas called it 'a bloody massacre'.
The Israeli army initially said its ships had fired shells at militants who launched rockets against the Jewish state after Israel's killing of a top militant who also served as a senior security chief appointed by the Hamas-led government.
But army spokesman Jacob Dallal said later that the shells were neither fired by Israeli naval ships nor the air force. 'We are checking if it was artillery,' he said." ...
The Truth Will Set You Free: Nowhere to Hide - Israelis kill 6yr old girl and her family in Gaza: "
A SIX-YEAR-OLD Palestinian girl, her mother and elder brother were killed in a house on the edge of Gaza City last night, shortly after a stray Israeli missile targeting militants struck a residential area.There is no end to Israeli brutality.
The girl, identified as Rawan Hajaj, was taken to hospital wrapped in blankets, the back of her head shorn open. Six others were injured when what Palestinians described as an artillery shell hit the house.
The Israeli military, initially denying that any shells had been fired, later admitted a missile had missed its target in an open field and landed on a street in the Shajaya district on the outskirts of the city, near the Karni border crossing.
Palestinians have nowhere to hide.
They are born with an Israeli bullet or missile in their name.
And on it is inscribed made in the U.S.A. ...
Girl killed as Israel tightens grip on Gaza - Sunday Times - Times Online: "July 09, 2006 | Marie Colvin in Gaza
A SIX-YEAR-OLD Palestinian girl, her mother and elder brother were killed in a house on the edge of Gaza City last night, shortly after a stray Israeli missile targeting militants struck a residential area.
The girl, identified as Rawan Hajaj, was taken to hospital wrapped in blankets, the back of her head shorn open. Six others were injured when what Palestinians described as an artillery shell hit the house.
The Israeli military, initially denying that any shells had been fired, later admitted a missile had missed its target in an open field and landed on a street in the Shajaya district on the outskirts of the city, near the Karni border crossing." ...
Ramzy Baroud: And Israel Shall Be Safe Again: "July 5, 2006 | How Many More Must Die? | By RAMZY BAROUD
The June 25 Palestinian fighters' raid on an Israeli military post near the Gaza-Egypt border has sent Israel 'scrambling to defend itself,' the voice of a BBC news reporter declared on the evening news."
The report was followed by an unchallenging interview with a spokesman for the Israeli foreign ministry, then another with an Israeli daily newspaper reporter in Washington. No Palestinian voice was heard for days. The two Israelis communicated the same, tired, albeit ominous discourse that seems to understand, thus convey any event based on the misguided assumption that only Israeli lives matter.
There was hardly any international news source in English--including those originating from Middle Eastern Arab countries--that accepted the Palestinian predawn attack on the Israeli military base as a clear act of retaliation and a dignified one at that. After all, Israel has murdered scores of Palestinian civilians in the last few weeks, while Palestinians have refrained from following the same course, instead targeting the same Israeli soldiers who have inflicted untold hurt on the residents of Gaza.
Could it be possible that Middle East arms of major news media have mistakenly overlooked what has been happening in the Gaza Strip since the supposed Israeli withdrawal in September 2005?
It all started with extremely loud sonic booms, mock bombardments and Israeli fighter jets flying low over the overpopulated and impoverished Gaza Strip. Palestinians called on the international community to interfere to stop Israeli provocations. Their calls, as usual, fell on deaf ears
With such scare tactics, Israel wished to convey to Palestinians a loud and clear message: there is nothing for you to celebrate; were still the masters of your destiny, and unlike the South Lebanon 2000 withdrawal, we are leaving Gaza triumphantly, and possibly just temporarily.
Soon, Israel's mock attacks became more genuine, while the international community continued to turn a blind eye to what would soon become another routine in 'liberated' Gaza. As far the media was concerned, there was hardly much to report, since Hamas, along with other Palestinian factions refused to respond to the provocations with violent retaliation, confining themselves to a unilateral ceasefire they'd reached with PA President Mahmoud Abbas in Cairo earlier.
Fed up the with the Palestinian response--or lack thereof--Israeli officials coupled their scare tactics with menacing, specific threats, with a bottom line that no Palestinian was immune from Israeli targeted assassinations. Indeed, they lived up to their words.
In an interesting turn of events, Hamas won the parliamentary elections in January 2006 in an astounding display of transparency and democratic process. John Hughes of the Christian Science Monitor echoed the mainstream media line that something went horribly wrong in the Middle East and that the "Hamas victory is a setback" to whatever imaginary peace process Hughes knows of.
Comforted by the unconditional support of the US government, Israel's violent intimidation and scare tactics became much more abound. This time however, the Israeli war on the Palestinians became an extension of an international one, led by the United States along with the ever-compliant United Nations and European Union. While Western donors held back their aid to the point of creating a humanitarian catastrophe in the Occupied Territories, the US led a campaign of political coercion--in a rare display of unity between Democrats and Republicans and all of "Israel's friends" in the media. ...
Hamas vows revenge after Israel hits PM's office - Yahoo! News: " by Sakher Abu El Oun Sun Jul 2, 6:45 PM ET | GAZA CITY (AFP)
Israel struck at the heart of the Palestinian government, hitting the Gaza office of the Hamas prime minister in a new wave of air raids and warning it would use all its power to free a soldier captured by militants a week ago.
The armed wing of Hamas threatened to retaliate by resuming attacks inside Israel, predicting the region would sink in a "sea of blood" if the Israeli offensive continued.
"The Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades warn the Zionist enemy: if its operations continue, we will hit the occupation targets we were previously reluctant to strike," said a statement received by AFP in Gaza City ...
Hamas vows revenge after Israel hits PM's office - Yahoo! News: " by Sakher Abu El Oun Sun Jul 2, 6:45 PM ET | GAZA CITY (AFP)
Israel struck at the heart of the Palestinian government, hitting the Gaza office of the Hamas prime minister in a new wave of air raids and warning it would use all its power to free a soldier captured by militants a week ago.
The armed wing of Hamas threatened to retaliate by resuming attacks inside Israel, predicting the region would sink in a "sea of blood" if the Israeli offensive continued.
"The Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades warn the Zionist enemy: if its operations continue, we will hit the occupation targets we were previously reluctant to strike," said a statement received by AFP in Gaza City.
Hamas vows revenge after Israel hits PM's office - Yahoo! News: " by Sakher Abu El Oun Sun Jul 2, 6:45 PM ET | GAZA CITY (AFP)
Israel struck at the heart of the Palestinian government, hitting the Gaza office of the Hamas prime minister in a new wave of air raids and warning it would use all its power to free a soldier captured by militants a week ago.
The armed wing of Hamas threatened to retaliate by resuming attacks inside Israel, predicting the region would sink in a "sea of blood" if the Israeli offensive continued.
"The Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades warn the Zionist enemy: if its operations continue, we will hit the occupation targets we were previously reluctant to strike," said a statement received by AFP in Gaza City.
Hamas vows revenge after Israel hits PM's office - Yahoo! News: " by Sakher Abu El Oun Sun Jul 2, 6:45 PM ET | GAZA CITY (AFP) Israel struck at the heart of the Palestinian government, hitting the Gaza office of the Hamas prime minister in a new wave of air raids and warning it would use all its power to free a soldier captured by militants a week ago.
The armed wing of Hamas threatened to retaliate by resuming attacks inside Israel, predicting the region would sink in a "sea of blood" if the Israeli offensive continued.
"The Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades warn the Zionist enemy: if its operations continue, we will hit the occupation targets we were previously reluctant to strike," said a statement received by AFP in Gaza City.
Hamas vows revenge after Israel hits PM's office - Yahoo! News: " by Sakher Abu El Oun Sun Jul 2, 6:45 PM ET | GAZA CITY (AFP) -
" type="hidden"> SEARCH
News | News Photos | Images | Web" type="hidden"> Israel struck at the heart of the Palestinian government, hitting the Gaza office of the Hamas prime minister in a new wave of air raids and warning it would use all its power to free a soldier captured by militants a week ago.
The armed wing of Hamas threatened to retaliate by resuming attacks inside Israel, predicting the region would sink in a "sea of blood" if the Israeli offensive continued.
"The Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades warn the Zionist enemy: if its operations continue, we will hit the occupation targets we were previously reluctant to strike," said a statement received by AFP in Gaza City.
Excite News - Israeli Planes Pound Gaza Targets: "Jun 30, 8:28 AM (ET) | By IBRAHIM BARZAK
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip (AP) - Israel destroyed the office of the Palestinian interior minister in a series of airstrikes Friday, increasing the pressure on the Hamas government to release a kidnapped soldier a day after it delayed a broad ground offensive into the Gaza Strip.
Also Friday, Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh said that Israel's offensive in Gaza was part of a premeditated plan to bring down the Hamas-led government.
Israel's air force has struck more than 30 targets in Gaza - including the Palestinian Interior Ministry - in response to the kidnapping of an Israeli soldier by Palestinian militants on Sunday.
Haniyeh said the military offensive was not only about rescuing the soldier, but also crippling Hamas, which has refused to renounce violence since being swept to power in January parliamentary elections.
Meanwhile, Israel's air force struck more than 30 targets in Gaza over 24 hours, hitting roads, bridges and power plants. The army also fired hundreds of artillery shells in the offensive to force Hamas-linked militants to release Cpl. Gilad Shalit, 19. He was captured Sunday when Gaza militants tunneled under the border, attacking an Israeli outpost and killing two other soldiers. ...
