Death Toll Rises in Gaza
CBN News
May 15, 2007
CBNNews.com - GAZA STRIP - Efforts Monday night by Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and PA Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh to end the last three days of bloodshed in the Gaza Strip proved unsuccessful.
The Palestinian death toll reached 16 on Tuesday, after gunbattles were renewed between Fatah and Hamas in Gaza late at night. There were five fatalities in four separate incidents.
Tuesday morning, Hamas gunmen attacked a Fatah-affiliated Presidential Guard training camp near the Karni Crossing, killing eight and wounding 20 members of the Guard.
Presidential Guard spokesman Ahmed al-Kaisi said Hamas operatives used mortars, rockets and rocket-propelled grenades in the attack.
According to eyewitnesses, Hamas gunmen fired a missile at a jeep transporting Fatah security forces to the base to help. The jeep overturned and the gunmen shot and killed the seven men inside.
"We consider this a serious provocation and a crime committed in cold blood," said al-Kaisi, noting that many of the recruits at the training camp were unarmed.
During the attack, Israel Defense Forces troops spotted two armed Palestinians, later identified as policemen, approaching the fence south of the crossing. Suspecting they were they were part of the attack force, they shot at them, killing one man.
While Hamas said the attack avenged the death of Ibrahim Maniyeh, the commander of their military wing killed in the Sajaiyah neighborhood near the Karni Crossing, Hamas also claimed Israel was responsible for all the deaths.
The IDF refuted the claim, adding that should Hamas stake out positions near the crossing, it would create a grave security risk.
The Karni Crossing, which has enjoyed a period of relative calm recently, is one of the main arteries used to transport goods to and from Gaza.
The Presidential Guard's base near Karni serves as one of its main posts in Gaza. Here, a team of American security personnel have been training members of the Guard on how to check cargo coming through the crossing.
Following Tuesday's attack, the IDF closed the crossing. They will decide if it can be reopened Wednesday.
Three of the mortar shells landed inside Israel near Kibbutz Nahal Oz, at the edge of the Gaza Strip. No one was injured, but there was some property damage.
Elsewhere, a Hamas operative was killed in a shootout with PA security forces in Gaza City early Tuesday morning.
Later, armed Hamas forces surrounded a Palestinian police center in northern Jabalia, while other armed Hamas forces barricaded themselves inside Gaza's Islamic University. Hamas officials warned that if the university is attacked, even "the house of will not be safe.
Sources: YNet, The Associated Press
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