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Before Powell Speech, Israeli Troops Invade Beit Hanun
GAZA CITY, Nov. 19 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Three Israeli tanks rolled more than a kilometer (half a mile) into the Palestinian-ruled town of Beit Hanun in the northern Gaza Strip on Monday, Palestinian security officials said.
The tanks entered a farming area in the town near the Erez border crossing without provocation sparking exchanges of gunfire, but no injuries were reported, Palestinian officials said.
The incursion followed reports of the deaths of two Palestinian men in the same area late Sunday.
Palestinian security sources charged that Israeli occupation troops wounded and then assassinated two security force members after they made a similar incursion into the neighboring town of Beit Lahia.
Sources also said the troops wrecked a Palestinian police position.
Earlier, two Palestinians were killed Sunday by Israeli army in the north of the Gaza Strip as they tried to sneak into the Jewish settlement of Dougit, an Israeli military spokesman said.
He said the two were shot dead by Israeli soldiers.
In early October, two members of the armed wing of the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement, or Hamas, managed to get past tight security around the Alei Sinai settlement near Dougit and killed two Israelis and wounded 15 others before being killed themselves.
Sunday's deaths bring the number of people killed in the Palestinian uprising to 976 since it started in September last year. Of those, 765 are Palestinians - the majority of whom are children and teenagers - and 189 Israelis.
Meanwhile the Palestinian Authority (PA) called Israeli claims about a withdrawal from the northern West Bank town of Tulkarm as "cheap propaganda," the Palestinian Information Center (PIC) reported Monday.
The governor of Tulkarm, Zuheir Manasrah, said the Israeli army remained entrenched in and around the city.
"I could see Israeli tanks from my office," said Manasrah. "They are well into the town, and Israeli troops, with their heavy machineguns pointed at the streets, are still posted on rooftops in Tulkarm. So, don't pay attention to their lies about a pullout."
Manasrah added that Israeli troops were still in full control of several neighborhoods inside Tulkarm, including the western suburbs, Irtah and Sheweika.
"They left the rooftop of one home, and they call that withdrawal…they are professional liars, and the sad thing is that much of the world believes them," said Manasrah.
The Israeli army re-occupied Tulkarm and most other towns in the West Bank following the killing of an Israeli cabinet minister several weeks ago, PIC reported.
The Israeli army effectively controls all Palestinian population centers, although the PA runs the day-to-day affairs of the population, it added.
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