Five Palestinians, including one child, killed in Gaza on Tuesday

Tuesday May 20, 2008 23:40 by Rami Almeghari & Saed Bannoura - IMEMC & Agencies

Palestinian sources in the Gaza Strip reported that five Palestinians, including one child, were killed in separate Israeli attacks in the Gaza Strip on Tuesday.

Medical sources reported that a child and a farmer were killed and two other Palestinians were wounded when the army shelled several areas, including houses and farmlands, in the northern and central parts of the Gaza Strip.

The Palestinian news agency, WAFA, identified the child as Majd Ziad Abu Okal, 13, from Beit Lahia. The killed farmer was identified as Hamdi Al Dahdouh, 32, from Juhr Al Deek in the central Gaza Strip; his body was severely mutilated.

Also on Wednesday, one fighter was killed and five Palestinian were wounded in an Israeli shelling that targeted a group of fighters in Al Zeitoun neighborhood, south of Gaza City.

The fighter was identified as Mohammad Khamees Odah, 28, member of the Al Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas movement. Five residents were injured in the shelling. On Tuesday evening, resident Zayid Abu Wadi, 23, died of wounds sustained during the shelling which at the time led to the death of Odah, medical sources reported.

A fifth resident, identified as Ali Al Dahdouh, 32, was killed when the army shot him in his head as he was driving his car in Juhr Al Deek area.

The Israeli army claimed that the shelling targeted fighters who fired homemade shells into adjacent Israeli areas.

Also on Tuesday, the army invaded Al Maghazi refugee camp, in the central Gaza Strip, and bulldozed farmlands in the area. 

Updated from:

Separate Israeli army attacks on Gaza leave three killed

by: Rami Almeghari, Tue, 20 May 2008 09:40:16

    Israeli army attacks on Gaza Tuesday left three Palestinians killed including a 13-year-old child, a farmer and a resistance fighter.

Medical sources said Tuesday afternoon that the number of those killed on Tuesday during separate Israeli army attacks on the Gaza Strip, mounted to three after a Hamas resistance fighter was killed in an Israeli tank opened fire on the eastern Gaza neighborhood of aL-Zaytoun.

Dr. Moawiya Abu Hasanin, chief of emergency department at the Gaza's health ministry, said that at least a body of one Palestinian arrived dismembered at the Gaza's Shifa hospital. Hamas's armed wing,the Al Qassam Brigades, confirmed that Mohammad Odah, a 25-year-old fighter was killed Tuesday afternoon, and that three others were wounded during an Israeli army tank shelling to the east of Gaza city.

Earlier in the day, two separate Israeli air strikes claimed the lives of two residents in the northern Gaza Strip city of Beit Lahiya and the Johor Al Deek village in central Gaza Strip. Medical sources confirmed that Majd Abu Okal, a 13-year-old child from the northern Gaza Strip city of Beit Lahiya, was killed instantly after sustaining a rocket shrapnel.

The sources said that another resident was also wounded by the same shrapnel. Witnesses in Beit Lahiya said that an Israeli warplane fired at least one missile towards a group of people, killing the child and wounding one man at least.

Israeli army announced earlier that an air strike targeted a number of resistance fighters on Gaza-Israel border lines in Beit Lahiya. In the Johor Al Deek village on the central Gaza-Israel border lines , a seperate air strike killed a farmer, witnesses and medics said.

Meanwhile, witnesses said that three Israeli tanks, accompanied by a bulldozer, rolled earlier on Tuesday dawn into the central Gaza Strip refugee camp of Maghazi, under a barrage of heavy gunfire. The witnesses added that the bulldozer began razing Palestinian-owned farm lands just close to the border fence with Israel, to the east of the camp.

Today's Israeli attacks came while Hamas officials are holding a new round of ceasefire talks with Egyptian mediators in Cairo, as Israeli media reports hinted over the weekend at a likely Israeli army large offensive on Gaza.

gaza strip | israeli attacks | news report rami at imemc dot org