More than 30 Palestinians were injured today when the Israeli army blasted with heavy weapons the Khan Yunis refugee camp near a Jewish settlement in the southern Gaza Strip, witnesses and hospital officials said.
Officials at Nasr hospital in Khan Yunis said more than 30 people, many of them woman and children, were injured by bullets and shrapnel in the attack against the camp which is near the settlement of Neve Dekalim.
The medical official said many of the injuries were serious and five people were in critical condition, three of them children.
Witnesses said the Israeli army responded to Palestinian gunfire on Neve Dekalim with a prolonged assault, firing explosive shells and heavy-caliber machine-guns, causing injuries, panic and badly damaging at least five homes.
An Israeli army spokeswoman said that Israeli soldiers had come under a steady stream of fire and that Palestinians also launched an anti-tank rocket at a military post.
"In the industrial area, the Palestinians are shooting at us constantly. We are not using tanks, only machine-guns," added the spokeswoman.
Palestinian witnesses said that shooting has ceased from their side and that frightened residents had fled their homes as darkness fell.
AFP