Israel says 56 buildings destroyed in Gaza

8.25am

TEL AVIV - The Israeli army said on Monday its forces had withdrawn from a refugee camp in southern Gaza after a six-day operation that drew an international outcry.

But senior military officials said the troops would enter the camp to destroy tunnels used to smuggle weapons from Egypt as deemed necessary.

"We are taking a deep breath and this goes on," a senior military official said. The army said its forces destroyed three tunnels during the operation, leaving Israeli media speculating over whether the operation had met its goals.

Major-General Dan Harel, head of the army's southern command, told a news conference that Israeli troops had destroyed or badly damaged 56 structures in Rafah, including homes, warehouses and abandoned buildings.

Some buildings were damaged when arms-smuggling tunnels were blown up and others were positions used by gunmen or were razed to avoid booby-traps, he said.

The UN relief agency UNRWA and other rights groups said Israeli forces demolished 180 homes.

Senior military officials said Israeli troops had killed 40 "terrorists" and at least seven Palestinian civilians during the operation.

They said the total civilian toll was 14, but that at least two civilians were killed by Palestinian gunmen during the fighting.

The officials said the army was investigating whether its forces were behind the killings of four Palestinians, including a three-year-old girl shot and killed at the weekend.

Harel expressed regret for the killings of civilians and damage to their property, saying: "We feel for the Rafah people. Our war is not with them. Our war is with the terrorists."

Palestinians said a total of 42 Palestinian civilians and militants were killed in the operation, which caused a swathe of destruction in the camp and left hundreds of residents homeless and thousands without water or electricity.

Harel said the army was not planning any mass demolitions of Palestinian homes near a border road patrolled by Israeli troops until the proposal had been approved by the government and undergone judicial review.

- REUTERS