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World Jewish News
Gaza hospital, UN facility hit in Hamas-IDF fighting
15.01.2009
The Al-Quds hospital in Gaza City was engulfed in flames on Thursday after caught in the fighting between Israel Defense Forces troops and Hamas.
Just before, the IDF shelled the main United Nation aid compound in the city of Gaza, drawing harsh criticism from visiting UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon and a subsequent apology from Defense Minister Ehud Barak.
The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) said its compound, where up to 700 Palestinians were being sheltered, was hit twice by fire and three staff members were wounded.
Another explosion blasted a tower block that houses the offices of Reuters and several other media organisations, wounding a journalist for the Abu Dhabi television channel.
At least 15 Palestinians were killed in the fighting and dozens of terrified residents were seen fleeing on foot while thousands more huddled in homes that provided precarious shelter.
Thousands of Gaza City residents fled their homes on Thursday morning as ground forces made their deepest foray yet into a crowded residential area, on Day 20 of its offensive on the Hamas-ruled coastal territory.
The Palestinian death toll from Israel's air-and-ground offensive has risen to at least 1,055, according to the Hamas-run Health Ministry in Gaza.
A Palestinian rights group said 670 of the dead were civilians. Thirteen Israelis have been killed - 10 soldiers, and three civilians hit by Hamas rocket fire.
IDF ground troops make deepest foray in Gaza neighborhood
Israeli troops backed by helicopter gunships, tanks and heavy guns thrust further into the city than ever before to seek out Hamas fighters, executing the army's most relentless shelling of the Gaza Strip in nearly three weeks of fighting.
Live video footage from a Reuters camera in central Gaza showed sustained artillery fire from the edge of the city for several hours. Shells exploded in downtown areas and long machinegun bursts echoed off Gaza's cramped housing blocks.
Much of the fighting was centred in the Tel al-Hawa neighborhood, where some residents fled on foot while others remained in the precarious shelter of their homes as a night-time attack stretched into the morning.
Tanks and bulldozers rolled into a neighborhood park, apparently seizing it as a kind of command center, witnesses said. Masked gunmen ran toward the areas under fire carrying bags containing unidentified objects.
Residents were seen fleeing their homes in pajamas, some wheeling elderly parents in wheelechairs. Others were stopping journalists' armored cars or ambulances pleading for someone to take them to safety.
Israeli forces have encircled the city of 500,000 people for days. Tanks have made forays towards the center to test the resistance of Hamas and other militant groups but have balked at launching all-out urban warfare in Gaza City, where Hamas militants are more familiar with the lay of the land and Israeli casualties would be liable to spiral.
Israel Air Force planes struck some 70 targets overnight, including weapons positions, rocket squads and a mosque in southern Gaza that it said served as an arsenal, the military said.
Seven Palestinians were killed overnight, medical officials said.
In an effort to keep the death toll from ballooning further, Egypt was
pressing both sides to accept a 10-day truce instead of a comprehensive accord to end the conflict.
The Palestinian death toll in Israel's Gaza offensive topped 1,000 on Wednesday, the Hamas-run Health Ministry said Wednesday.
The Gaza-based Palestinian Center for Human rights said more than 670 civilians were among the dead. Ten Israeli soldiers and three civilians hit by rockets fired from the Gaza Strip have been killed since Israel launched its campaign on Dec. 27.
Источник: Haaretz
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