13 killed as Israel invades northern Gaza

GAZA CITY: Thirteen Palestinian civilians and militants were killed Thursday as Israel thrust deeper into the Gaza Strip in its largest and deadliest operation in months, reoccupying areas evacuated 10 months ago.   

Israeli forces set up a buffer zone in northern Gaza as it widened its offensive, cranking up the pressure on the Hamas-led Palestinian government in a bid to free a captured soldier. Palestinian militants claimed to have shot dead an Israeli soldier in fighting in Gaza, although there was no confirmation.        

Israeli troops also entered the Palestinian territory from the south, in a two-pronged attack that marked a further escalation in the spiraling crisis that erupted after the June 25 abduction of a teenage Israeli soldier.      

In the worst incident Thursday, nine Palestinians were killed, including two militants loyal to the Islamist movement Hamas, and at least 24 wounded in an Israeli bombardment on the northern Gaza town of Beit Lahiya, medics said.          

Palestinian prime minister Ismail Haniya, whose Hamas-led government has been directly targeted in the offensive, slammed the assault as "collective punishment" on his people and demanded international intervention.         

The massive pre-dawn land and air assault on Gaza sent terrified residents scurrying from their homes with babies and belongings.         

"We woke up and the tanks were right there. There were fighters in our garden. We had to flee to protect the children," said one father, rushing away from a Beit Lahiya neighbourhood with his wife and four children.           

In northern Gaza, ground forces, armoured vehicles and sappers advanced up to five kilometres (three miles) in a bid to expand a unilaterally declared security zone aimed at preventing rocket attacks on Israel.             

Further troops massed around the towns of Beit Hanun and Beit Lahiya in the deepest Israeli ground operation since 19-year-old Corporal Gilad Shalit was siezed 11 days ago, sparking the worst Middle East crisis in months.              

Cross-faction units of Palestinian fighters put up stiff resistance in the northern and southern Gaza Strip, several of them being killed under Israel's intense aerial firepower.        

A 20-year-old civilian was killed by machine-gun fire from an Israeli tank in Beit Lahiya. A member of the armed wing of Hamas -- which is one of three groups claiming to hold Shalit -- was killed in an overnight raid.    

In the south, another two Palestinians were killed and five wounded in an Israeli air strike after ground forces came under fire from at least eight rockets. The army said the raid targeted an "anti-tank cell".      

Another Palestinian group which was among the three that claimed Shalit's abduction said it had killed an Israeli soldier in Beit Lahiya, but there was no immediate confirmation from the army.       

Trucks and infantry took over the remains of Dugit, Elei Sinai and Nissanit settlements, razed last year as part of Israel's historic pullout from the territory that had meant to draw the curtain on a 38-year occupation. The return of Israeli troops to Gaza has evoked memories of the army's disastrous invasion of Lebanon where its soldiers became bogged down from 1982 until 2000 before pulling out of a self-declared buffer zone.             

Dozens of Palestinian families in the Gaza Strip, fearing for their lives faced with the ominous sight of approaching Israeli armour, fled their homes at dawn. Women clutching babies and a few belongings scurried away on foot toward a line of waiting taxis amid the boom of gunfire.    

The offensive has sparked concerns of a humanitarian fall-out with the 1.4 million residents of the largely impoverished Gaza already grappling with food shortages, fuel and power cuts.
 Palestinian officials and residents believe Israel is using the soldier's capture as an excuse to try to topple the Hamas government which took office in March.              

"If you return Gilad Shalit home safe and sound and if you stop your rocket attacks, we will withdraw our forces," Defence Minister Amir Peretz said in comments addressed to the Palestinians on army radio. But Tzahi Hanegbi, chairman of the parliament's defence and foreign affairs committee, did not rule out the possibility of a long-term presence, saying "it could also be years" if rocket attacks continued.           

An unprecedented Hamas rocket attack on Tuesday on the Israeli Mediterranean city of Ashkelon smashed into a school, causing extensive damage and leading Israel's security cabinet to order the military to step up its offensive and section off parts of Gaza.     

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert himself warned that the Ashkelon attack would have "far-reaching consequences" to be felt first by Hamas. Israel has already bombed the Gaza offices of both the Hamas premier and interior minister, in the occupied West Bank arrested a third of the cabinet and raided multiple militant targets.       

In Washington, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called on Israelis and Palestinians to exercise restraint but said it was "high time" for Hamas to return the abducted soldier. UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, terming the situation "dangerous" and potentially "explosive", also urged both sides "to step back from the brink".         

But repeated international calls for restraint have largely fallen on deaf ears in what has become the worst Middle East crisis since Hamas came to power in March and Olmert formally took the helm in May.            

Israel has vowed to unleash its full military might on Gaza, while Hamas's armed wing has warned of a "new era of violence" against the Jewish state.              

Israel says Shalit is still alive but has ruled out any negotiations with militants and promised to strike anyone linked to them, in a thinly-veiled reference to Syria.