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New Israeli Incursions, Strongest Tank Destroyed
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Destroying Israel’s strongest tank is seen as a severe blow to a symbol of military might. |
NABLUS, West Bank, Feb. 15 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Israeli troops backed up by tanks on Friday moved into two Palestinian self-rule villages, abducted at least three people, and shot dead one Palestinian, after the killing, late Thursday night, of three Israeli soldiers and injury of two others in an ambush by Palestinian resistance activists in the Gaza Strip, news agencies reported.
In the village of Saida in the West Bank, A Palestinian was shot dead early Friday when Israeli troops made an incursion into the Palestinian village under full Palestinian Authority’s control, AFP reported.
Witnesses and Israeli state radio reported that Israeli troops backed up by some 20 tanks and two assault helicopters moved into Saida, near the town of Tulkarem. Occupation troops had also entered a village near Jenin, also in the north of the West Bank.
Members of an elite unit were combing Saida allegedly looking for resistance activists. The Israeli unit abducted at least one member of Palestinian resistance group Jihad. At least two other Jihad activists had been captured in the other incursion.
The incursion is not seen as a retaliation for the latest Palestinian operation in Gaza, but rather part of an ongoing Israeli plan to abduct Palestinian activists in the West Bank and Gaza, and destroy the infrastructure of the Palestinian Authority.
Meanwhile, the military wing of the Popular Resistance Committees in Palestine claimed Friday the attack overnight that left three Israeli soldiers dead and another lightly wounded in the Gaza Strip.
A statement from the Al-Nasser Saladin Group said it acted in reprisal for "the killing of five of our sons from the Palestinian security forces by the Zionist criminal enemy."
Five Palestinian policemen were killed during Israeli occupation forces incursions on Tuesday and Wednesday into the central and northern Gaza Strip.
An Israeli army spokesman said earlier Friday that the three Israelis killed were members of the crew of a Merkava tank, the first to be destroyed in a Palestinian attack. The Merkava is considered the safest tank in the world.
The Israeli army said the attack marked the first time a roadside bomb managed to seriously penetrate an Israeli tank's armor in the Palestinian territories. Even in roadside bomb attacks in Lebanon over the past decade the armor of Israeli tanks has never been hit hard enough to strike an entire tank crew, according to Israeli daily newspaper, Ha’aretz.
Israeli military officials said half an hour before the tank was hit, Palestinians opened fire on a convoy guarded by soldiers and set off a bomb that damaged a bus but caused no injuries. The army sent a tank into the area and a huge bomb exploded under it in what appears to have a planned two-stage gun-and-bomb ambush.
The tank was toppled on its side and the turret blown off. The only surviving member of the tank crew was evacuated by helicopter to Soroka Hospital in Beersheba.
It was also the first time Palestinian activists had used such a sophisticated and powerful anti-armor device in their 16-month Intifada against Israeli occupation.
The resistance activists appeared to have carefully studied routine Israeli army procedures and planted the bomb where they thought the tank would pass, BBC reported.
Israeli commentators called the operation a severe blow to a symbol of military might.
The Israeli army is investigating the operation. Analysts say Israel will have to review its strategy of freely moving into Palestinian Authority areas, relying on heavy armor for protection.
According to Ha’aretz, this is the kind of sophisticated operation that Hezbollah used to carry out against Israeli forces when they occupied the south of the country, sending Israeli troops out in May, 2000.
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