Israeli tanks and troops began withdrawing from Rafah refugee camp yesterday under international pressure to end three days of fighting in which 41 Palestinians were killed.
An Israeli military source said a "redeployment" was under way.
PHOTO: REUTERS
The Israeli army, saying it was searching for weapons-smuggling tunnels dug under the Egypt-Gaza border, sent dozens of tanks and hundreds of troops into Rafah on Tuesday in the biggest Gaza raid in years after militants killed 13 soldiers.
Israeli security sources said a smaller contingent would remain in Rafah, a militant stronghold, for an undefined period of time.
As troops withdrew, leaving behind torn-up roads and toppled power lines, hundreds of residents in the Brazil neighborhood returned to their homes to find some 25 had been destroyed while they had taken refuge away from the violence.
"We took our children away and fled for our lives and as you see the houses are completely demolished," Rafah resident Naeema Abu-Jerida said.
"Thank God we had time to leave, but we had no chance to take any of our belongings with us," Abu-Jerida said.
International pressure on Israel to quit the area mounted after its forces killed 10 Palestinians at a peaceful protest in Rafah on Wednesday. Troops said they did not aim to hit the rally.
US President George W. Bush's administration showed rare displeasure with Israel by not vetoing a UN resolution urging an end to the violence.
In Washington, a senior State Department official said Israeli Vice Premier Ehud Olmert had assured the US it would not demolish any more homes in Rafah or widen an adjacent flashpoint buffer zone on the Egyptian frontier.
"Olmert did tell us when he came in Tuesday that there would not be further demolition of houses and that they were not going to widen the strip. We'll see what happens," said an official who asked not to be named.
Israeli Attorney General Menachem Mazuz on Thursday instructed the army to recast its plan to expand the Israeli-patrolled buffer area dubbed "Philadelphi Road" to limit the number of Palestinian homes that would be razed, Israeli media reported.
Israel's army chief had threatened to destroy hundreds of houses in a bid to boost security for soldiers who come under constant attack in the border strip.
"My house was toppled on our heads," recalled Nabil Hassan, 52, as he stood on the rubble of his home yesterday.
"The army did not warn us, did not ask us to leave, they started while we were still inside," he said.
He said he and his family of 13 had taken shelter in a bathroom as bulldozers continued working but managed to get out after a neighbor told soldiers they were still inside.
In apparent preparation for the partial pullout, soldiers distributed leaflets in Rafah listing names of wanted militants and warning residents against cooperating with them.
"These people are sabotaging your life with their terrorist activity," the leaflets said.
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
UNREST: The authorities in Turkey arrested 13 Turkish journalists in five days, deported a BBC correspondent and on Thursday arrested a reporter from Sweden Waving flags and chanting slogans, many hundreds of thousands of anti-government demonstrators on Saturday rallied in Istanbul, Turkey, in defence of democracy after the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu which sparked Turkey’s worst street unrest in more than a decade. Under a cloudless blue sky, vast crowds gathered in Maltepe on the Asian side of Turkey’s biggest city on the eve of the Eid al-Fitr celebration which started yesterday, marking the end of Ramadan. Ozgur Ozel, chairman of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), which organized the rally, said there were 2.2 million people in the crowd, but
JOINT EFFORTS: The three countries have been strengthening an alliance and pressing efforts to bolster deterrence against Beijing’s assertiveness in the South China Sea The US, Japan and the Philippines on Friday staged joint naval drills to boost crisis readiness off a disputed South China Sea shoal as a Chinese military ship kept watch from a distance. The Chinese frigate attempted to get closer to the waters, where the warships and aircraft from the three allied countries were undertaking maneuvers off the Scarborough Shoal — also known as Huangyan Island (黃岩島) and claimed by Taiwan and China — in an unsettling moment but it was warned by a Philippine frigate by radio and kept away. “There was a time when they attempted to maneuver
RSS