A bomb planted by militants trying to blow up an Israeli bulldozer yesterday killed three Palestinians during an Israeli operation to destroy weapons-smuggling tunnels, the militants and the Israeli army said.
The roadside bomb in the Rafah refugee camp went off a few meters from where the bulldozer was piling up mounds of dirt in a crowded residential area, according to television footage.
PHOTO: AP
The violence came a day after vigilantes killed three Palestinians convicted of collaborating with Israel -- two of them in their hospital beds -- in an incident that highlighted the progressive breakdown of law and order in Gaza.
The Hamas militant organization said two of the casualties in Rafah were its members, and the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades claimed one of the dead men. The explosion blew off half of one man's skull.
Palestinian security officials said there was no fire from Israeli helicopters that were flying overhead or from Israeli tanks.
Reporters said the dead men were more than 200m away when they were hit by shrapnel from the huge explosion.
Ten people were wounded, including a Reuters TV cameraman who suffered a shrapnel wound in his hand, according to witnesses and hospital officials.
No Israelis were injured.
Moments before, masked militants were filmed putting a detonator in an alley near the road. Palestinian ambulances already were standing by, as people in nearby buildings waved white flags to show the Israelis the buildings were inhabited by civilians.
The Israeli army has been conducting an extensive operation in the Gaza-Egypt border area since before dawn yesterday.
The Rafah border area is strewn with land mines and other roadside bombs planted by militants. The bulldozers and sappers scour the area to destroy tunnels used by Palestinians to smuggle arms from Egypt into the Gaza Strip.
Meanwhile, Hamas aired a video on the Al-Arabiya satellite television showing three masked men surrounded by weapons. One of the men read a statement threatening to rain rockets from the Gaza Strip on the Israeli town of Sderot.
"We will continue to shell you every day to see what your defeated army will do for you," the Hamas threat said. "Oh residents of Sderot, stop your army from carrying out their crimes and get them out of Beit Hanoun, otherwise you will pay the price."
The Israeli army has been clearing fields in the Gaza town of Beit Hanoun since June, when two Sderot residents were killed by rocket fire.
On Monday, Palestinian vigilantes executed two collaborators in their beds in a Gaza hospital, where they were taken hours earlier with injuries from a grenade explosion in their jail cell that killed a third spy.
The episode occurred just as Palestinian President Yasser Arafat ordered a restoration of law and order in the Palestinian territories, where militants outgun the fragmented Palestinian police forces.
Also See Story:
US concerned over lengthy closure of Gaza-Egypt border
‘TAIWAN-FRIENDLY’: The last time the Web site fact sheet removed the lines on the US not supporting Taiwanese independence was during the Biden administration in 2022 The US Department of State has removed a statement on its Web site that it does not support Taiwanese independence, among changes that the Taiwanese government praised yesterday as supporting Taiwan. The Taiwan-US relations fact sheet, produced by the department’s Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, previously stated that the US opposes “any unilateral changes to the status quo from either side; we do not support Taiwan independence; and we expect cross-strait differences to be resolved by peaceful means.” In the updated version published on Thursday, the line stating that the US does not support Taiwanese independence had been removed. The updated
‘CORRECT IDENTIFICATION’: Beginning in May, Taiwanese married to Japanese can register their home country as Taiwan in their spouse’s family record, ‘Nikkei Asia’ said The government yesterday thanked Japan for revising rules that would allow Taiwanese nationals married to Japanese citizens to list their home country as “Taiwan” in the official family record database. At present, Taiwanese have to select “China.” Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said the new rule, set to be implemented in May, would now “correctly” identify Taiwanese in Japan and help protect their rights, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement. The statement was released after Nikkei Asia reported the new policy earlier yesterday. The name and nationality of a non-Japanese person marrying a Japanese national is added to the
AT RISK: The council reiterated that people should seriously consider the necessity of visiting China, after Beijing passed 22 guidelines to punish ‘die-hard’ separatists The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) has since Jan. 1 last year received 65 petitions regarding Taiwanese who were interrogated or detained in China, MAC Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said yesterday. Fifty-two either went missing or had their personal freedoms restricted, with some put in criminal detention, while 13 were interrogated and temporarily detained, he said in a radio interview. On June 21 last year, China announced 22 guidelines to punish “die-hard Taiwanese independence separatists,” allowing Chinese courts to try people in absentia. The guidelines are uncivilized and inhumane, allowing Beijing to seize assets and issue the death penalty, with no regard for potential
‘UNITED FRONT’ FRONTS: Barring contact with Huaqiao and Jinan universities is needed to stop China targeting Taiwanese students, the education minister said Taiwan has blacklisted two Chinese universities from conducting academic exchange programs in the nation after reports that the institutes are arms of Beijing’s United Front Work Department, Minister of Education Cheng Ying-yao (鄭英耀) said in an exclusive interview with the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper) published yesterday. China’s Huaqiao University in Xiamen and Quanzhou, as well as Jinan University in Guangzhou, which have 600 and 1,500 Taiwanese on their rolls respectively, are under direct control of the Chinese government’s political warfare branch, Cheng said, citing reports by national security officials. A comprehensive ban on Taiwanese institutions collaborating or
RSS