|
Israel Continues Aggression on Eve of Jewish New Year
RAMALLAH, Sept 17 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Israeli tanks and helicopters moved into Palestinian-controlled territory close to Ramallah in the West Bank Monday, news agencies reported.
Israeli occupation forces moved into Palestinian self-ruled land near the Beitunya checkpoint just south of Ramallah, wounding four Palestinian security officials amid heavy firing, security sources said.
One of the Palestinian casualties was in a serious condition, they said, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.
Heavy tank shelling by Israeli occupation forces damaged a mosque and a Palestinian fire truck, Palestinian security officials said.
Earlier, an Israeli soldier was critically injured when he was allegedly hit by sniper fire in the area, Israel's military sources said.
Palestinian students from the nearby Beir Zeit University threw stones Monday morning in protest of Israel's closure of roads ahead of the Jewish New Year.
Israeli security forces sealed the autonomous town, sparking anger among Palestinians unable to move in or out of the region.
Palestinian security officials said three Palestinians were also wounded in the Qalandiya refugee camp, located between Jerusalem and Ramallah, as Israeli occupation forces locked down the area, AFP reported.
Ramallah was the scene of intense clashes Saturday night as Israeli tanks and helicopter gunships made a four-hour incursion into the autonomous Palestinian town.
An Israeli soldier was shot dead when Palestinian gunmen fired on his elite army unit as it was arresting members of Palestinian President Yasser Arafat's Force 17 guards in Ramallah.
Elsewhere, two Palestinians were killed in the overnight operation, Palestinian medical officials said, while almost 40 were injured.
In further aggression, Israeli military fire killed a Palestinian in Rafah, near the border with Egypt early Monday, hospital sources said.
They said Abdelsalam Mohammad Olyyan, 35, was shot, and another unidentified man wounded, by Israeli fire, though there had been no official reports of gunfire exchanges.
Another Palestinian, Mohammad Ramadan al-Kafarna, 21, died Monday after he was shot by Israeli occupation troops Friday during an Israeli military incursion into Beit Hanun in the northern Gaza strip.
A third man, identified as security officer Mohammad Ghazi Shalwani, 39, succumbed to stomach wounds sustained last Thursday in an Israeli incursion into Jericho, east of Occupied Jerusalem.
The recent deaths brought to 813 the number of people killed since the start of the al-Aqsa Intifada, or uprising, nearly a year ago, most of them Palestinians - 623, of whom the majority are children and teenagers.
In other incidents Monday in the Gaza Strip, four young Palestinians were wounded when Israeli occupation troops fired on stone throwers near the Jewish settlement of Nezarim, medical sources said.
Two of them were seriously injured, in the head and the chest respectively, sources said.
Meanwhile, Israel beefed up security Monday for Jewish New Year celebrations.
Israeli police deployed thousands of men, assisted by soldiers, in public and commercial centers in all the main cities, AFP reported.
Israel every year tightens security on the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip during the celebrations.
Meanwhile, Palestinian Information Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo protested strongly Monday against Israeli occupation army plans to establish a buffer zone between Israel and the West Bank.
"We oppose this move by Israel, and Yasser Arafat has sent a letter to American President George W. Bush saying it will destroy the lives of thousands of Palestinians and the Oslo peace process," he told reporters.
"Palestinians will oppose every step to put this plan in place," he added.
Israel's occupation army announced Sunday that it would create a military buffer zone around Palestinian areas in the northern West Bank starting September 24th, and will not allow Palestinians through unless they have a special permit.
According to the BBC's online news service, Israel's army chief of staff, General Shaul Mofaz, has said his forces are preparing to implement such a zone, with fences, watchtowers and trenches.
Mofaz told Israeli television Sunday that buffer zones would be created in the coming week along the green line from Jenin to Tulkarem, in the northern West Bank.
It is not clear if the buffer zone would seal off all the Occupied Territories, but the implications are nonetheless far reaching, the BBC added.
Border police and soldiers, with far wider rules of engagement, will guard the zone
The zone will vary from several hundred meters (yards) up to between two and three kilometers.
The Palestine Media Center, quoting an unidentified official Palestinian spokesman, said the buffer zone was "a gravely racist and dangerous development."
"These zones will in effect serve as an ethnic-cleansing tool in the West Bank and constitute an outrageous breach of the Oslo accords."
The 1993 Oslo accords established limited Palestinian self-rule in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, but left the most volatile issues of borders and status for later negotiations.
|
