Israel killed 14 Palestinians and wounded some 80 others in a raid in the Gaza Strip today.
|
|
Israel launches attack on Gaza Strip last month in continuing efforts to tackle Hamas' 'terrorist infrastructure'.
|
Palestinian hospital officials said all the dead were civilians, including 10 people killed by a missile fired from a helicopter into a crowd that had gathered near a mosque.
It was the highest civilian death toll in Gaza since July 23rd when a bomb dropped by an Israeli plane killed 13 civilians as well as its target, Hamas's military commander.
Israel said the missile was launched as covering fire after its troops came under attack and that it regretted any civilian deaths in what it called an anti-terrorist raid into the Palestinian-controlled town of Khan Younis.
Among the wounded Palestinians were combatants brought in for treatment still clutching their assault rifles.
"The neighbourhood is a known Hamas terrorist bastion," Lieutenant-Colonel Adam Sussman, an Israeli field commander, told Israel Radio.
The raid, condemned by Palestinians as a massacre, occurred during a visit by EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana to push an initiative on behalf of an international "quartet" of Middle East peace brokers.
Israel has long regarded the EU as pro-Palestinian, and Palestinian officials accused Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon of trying to sabotage Mr Solana's mission.