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Seven palestinians killed { May 1 2003 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A63500-2003May1.htmlhttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A63500-2003May1.html
Seven Palestinians Killed in Israeli Raid
Fighting Comes One Day After Release of 'Road Map'
By Nidal al-Mughrabi
Reuters
Thursday, May 1, 2003; 7:15 AM
GAZA, May 1 -- Israeli tanks backed by helicopter gunships thrust into a militant stronghold in the Gaza Strip on Thursday, touching off battles which killed seven Palestinians, including a two-year-old, witnesses said.
The raid sent a strong signal to international mediators led by the United States and to the new Palestinian government that Israel would press ahead with such operations despite the release on Wednesday of a Middle East peace "road map."
Israeli officials say they will not change the way they confront a 31-month-old Palestinian uprising until the Palestinians show they are cracking down on militants as required by the "road map."
Residents of the Shijaia neighbourhood outside Gaza City said an Israeli armored force rumbled in after midnight, laying siege to the family home of a militant from the Islamic group Hamas and calling on those inside to leave.
Hamas and an armed offshoot of the Fatah faction of Palestinian President Yasser Arafat and new reformist Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas claimed responsibility for a Tel Aviv suicide bombing that killed three people on Wednesday.
Witnesses in Shijaia reported heavy fighting between Israeli soldiers and Palestinian gunmen and said tank shells were fired at the besieged home of Hamas militant Youssef Abu Heen. They said helicopter gunships fired missiles at what appeared to be positions held by gunmen.
Ahmed Ayyad, a blacksmith, said his two-year-old son, Amir, was killed by a bullet to the head as the toddler stood near a window facing Israeli troops.
"I could not help him," Ayyad said, choking back tears at the local morgue. "What road map? It is nonsense...the Israelis do not want peace -- you can ask my son."
Six other Palestinians, among them at least three civilians, were killed during the gun battle and more than a dozen wounded, witnesses and hospital officials said.
An Israeli military source confirmed that an operation was under way in Shijaia Òagainst the terrorist infrastructure.Ó The source said at least six soldiers were wounded in the fighting.
Earlier in the West Bank, two Palestinian gunmen were killed in an exchange of fire with Israeli soldiers near the village of Yatta, residents said.
At least 2,028 Palestinians and 737 Israelis have been killed in the conflict that erupted in September 2000 after the collapse of talks on a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, lands Israel occupied in the 1967 Middle East war.
"This is the practical translation and implementation of the road map," Hamas official Abdel-Aziz al-Rantissi said of ThursdayÕs raid.
Hamas and other militant groups have rejected the Òroad map" aimed at ending the violence and establishing a Palestinian state by 2005. They have vowed to keep up their campaign of suicide bombings against Israel in defiance of Abbas.
Palestinian cabinet minister Saeb Erekat called on the "Quartet" of international mediators -- the United States, United Nations, European Union and Russia -- to intervene immediately and put the peace plan in motion.
"We strongly condemn the Israeli crime that was committed only hours after the Israeli government received the road map," Erekat told Reuters. "Is this their response -- to kill innocents and children, the youngest only two years old?"
Israel said U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell was expected to arrive for talks on the "road map" on May 8.
Palestinian officials said Powell would meet Abbas but not Arafat, who Washington says is an obstacle to peace. Arafat denies fomenting violence.
Terje Roed-Larsen, the U.N. Middle East envoy, said that after the suicide bombing in Tel Aviv, he had spoken to senior Palestinian leaders about the need to rein in militants.
"IÕve told them repeatedly, as I did yesterday, that the Palestinian Authority will be finished unless the terrorism stops," Roed-Larsen told Israeli Army Radio.
© 2003 Reuters
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