At least 17 Palestinians have been killed as Israeli forces continue their incursion into the Rafah refugee camp in the southern Gaza Strip, Palestinian sources reported on Tuesday.
Israeli reports said the dead were mostly Palestinian fighters who were killed when Apache helicopters fired missiles.
Palestinians said three of the dead were unidentified as they were still inside houses and could not be evacuated.
Hospital officials in Rafah said 30 people have been wounded so far, 10 of them seriously.
Witnesses reported that at least 15 Israeli tanks and armoured vehicles entered the camp shortly after midnight. They were supported by Apache helicopters. Soldiers entered Rafah’s Tel Sultan neighbourhood and began searching for wanted militants and tunnels used to smuggle arms into the Strip under the adjacent Egyptian border.
”We intend to reach the tunnels and arrest the smugglers,” army chief of staff Moshe Ya’alon said at a briefing.
Lieutenant-General Ya’alon said militants had already succeeded in smuggling rocket propelled grenades into the Strip and more weapons, which he said came from Iran and the Lebanese Hezbollah group, were waiting on the Egyptian side of the border.
Palestinians said that despite international protests, the Israeli army began destroying buildings overnight on the border with Egypt.
Ya’alon said on Sunday Israel will demolish hundreds of Palestinian-owned houses in Rafah in order to widen and safeguard the so-called ”Philadelphi” buffer road between Rafah and the Egyptian border.
Last week five soldiers were killed in Rafah in an attack on an armoured vehicle traversing the buffer road.
Thousands of Palestinians already fled their homes on Monday as the Israeli army took up positions outside Rafah, isolating the town from the rest of the Gaza Strip.
The residents expected that the Israeli army operation in Rafah would last for a few days. – Sapa-DPA