Israel kills 19 Palestinians in big Gaza raid

7.40am

RAFAH, Gaza Strip - Israel's army killed at least 19 Palestinians on Tuesday in the heaviest raid in the Gaza Strip for years as tanks and infantry thrust into Rafah refugee camp, a militant stronghold, despite an international outcry.

The assault drew UN and European Union condemnation given Israeli threats to destroy hundreds of Palestinian homes there. Thousands of Palestinian houses have been razed since they began a revolt in occupied territory in 2000, UN figures show.

But the army said there were no plans for any systematic demolition during what it called an open-ended operation to stop the smuggling of weapons through tunnels from nearby Egypt.

US President George W. Bush called the Gaza bloodshed "troubling" but, addressing Jewish-Americans in a tight election campaign, told the powerful pro-Israel lobby group AIPAC that Israel "has every right to defend itself from terror".

A White House spokesman said it was in touch with the Israelis on the humanitarian impact of their incursion and was assured its goal was to stymie smuggling, not level homes.

The raid exacted the highest single-day Palestinian death toll -- militants and civilians alike -- since May 2002 when 23 were killed in an army sweep into the nearby Khan Younis area.

The Rafah hospital morgue became so overloaded on Tuesday that five bodies were shifted to vegetable freezers in a nearby market for preservation, medics said.

Violence has worsened in Gaza since Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon proposed evacuating troops and Jewish settlers in a plan backed by most Israelis and the United States, but held up by opposition from hardliners in his right-wing party.

Militant groups want to claim as a victory any pullout by Israel from territories it captured in the 1967 Middle East war, while the army is determined to smash them first.

Israel amassed more forces in Gaza than at any time since occupying it 37 years ago, commentators said, for a raid launched after militants killed 13 soldiers there last week -- the biggest blow to the army in two years.

Before the ground assault, Israeli helicopter gunships killed seven Palestinians, at least three of them gunmen and another a civilian, outside a mosque, witnesses said.

Other Palestinians, including at least one fighter, were shot dead during street battles. A teenage brother and sister were among the dead, killed on the roof as they fed pigeons and hung out washing, residents said.

Palestinian medics said soldiers held up ambulances trying to evacuate wounded. The army said it gave passage to all emergency service vehicles once roads were secured.

"We are afraid," said Miriam Abu Jazzar, surveying the blood-stained ruins of her daughter's home, smashed by a missile. "Every hour there is shooting."

The army said three buildings were demolished on Tuesday.

Palestinian President Yasser Arafat said "a big massacre" had happened in Rafah and called for international intervention to stop Israel's "military escalation and ugly crimes".

Army sources said soldiers had fired only at militants, hitting at least 15 of the gunmen.

Troops took vantage points in bullet-pocked dwellings in Rafah's volatile Tel al-Sultan district as soldiers searched house-to-house for militants and battled Palestinian gunmen. Dozens of people were wounded in air attacks and street clashes.

Militants fired rockets and set off hidden bombs in the cinderblock camp of 90,000 people, founded in 1949 for some of the 700,000 Palestinians uprooted by Israel's independence war.

The UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) set up tents to take in 1500 newly displaced people.

Amnesty International, in a new report, said Israel had destroyed more than 3000 Palestinian houses since 2000. It said demolitions were "punitive" and done without military necessity in most cases, constituting a war crime under international law.

Israel's Foreign Ministry responded by saying the army razed only buildings used as gun nests or hiding smuggling tunnels.

- REUTERS