US warns travellers of heightened danger in Middle East

GAZA - Israeli tanks thrust into a Gaza refugee camp yesterday, while Washington warned Americans in the Middle East and North Africa of a heightened attack threat after Israel's assassination of Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin.

"In the aftermath of the killing ... a Hamas spokesman has threatened revenge against ... United States interests," the US State Department said, telling Americans in the Gaza Strip to leave and advising against travel to Israel, the West Bank or Gaza.

US President George W. Bush said in Washington: "Whether it be a Hamas threat, or an al Qaeda threat, we take them very seriously in this Administration."

Israel has vowed to kill more top Palestinian militants, while Hamas replaced Yassin with a Gaza-based leader seen as a hardliner even within a group that uses suicide bombing as its main weapon.

But Hamas last night backed away from earlier threats against Washington.

The group's new leader in Gaza, Abdel-Aziz al-Rantissi, told reporters that his group's militant activities were aimed solely at Israel.

Meanwhile about 10 Israeli tanks backed by helicopter gunships rolled about 100m into Khan Younis refugee camp in Gaza and bulldozers razed several homes overlooking a Jewish settlement.

About 60 families fled their huts as the tanks laid down covering fire, witnesses said. There were no immediate reports of clashes with Palestinian gunmen, or casualties.

"The Army is clearing the area where terrorists could fire mortar bombs and anti-tank rockets towards Army positions and settlements in the area," a military source said.

Before the raid, Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz said Israel would keep targeting Hamas, a group dedicated to the destruction of the Jewish state.

"If we will continue, in a determined way, with our strikes against Hamas and other terror groups ... including action against those leaders, we will bring more security to Israeli citizens," Mofaz said.

Sources in Hamas said it had appointed a supreme leader and a new chief for the Gaza Strip to replace Yassin, Hamas' founder and spiritual leader who was killed in an Israeli helicopter missile strike outside a mosque.

Both Khaled Meshaal, believed by Israel to be in Syria, and al-Rantissi are opposed to any deal with the Jewish state.

While security forces were on high alert in Israeli cities for the painful payback Hamas has promised, violence mounted on the Israel-Lebanon border, where Israeli aircraft killed two members of a Palestinian rocket-launching squad yesterday.

Bush, in his first personal remarks on the killing of Yassin, backed what he called Israel's right to defend itself against terror but injected a note of caution. "And as she does so, I hope she keeps consequences in mind as to how to make sure we stay on the path to peace."

Bush said he hoped to send high-level emissaries to the Middle East next week to see if anything can be done to revive derailed Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations.

The 15-member United Nations Security Council held a debate on Yassin's killing after Arab ambassadors and the US failed to agree on a statement criticising Israel.

- REUTERS