Israeli forces in the Gaza Strip have killed three Palestinian security men in a gun battle and wounded at least 20 people in a separate raid on a refugee camp.
The bloodshed, which followed a mortar bomb attack that wounded 10 Israeli soldiers yesterday, showed that renewed US peace efforts after the Iraq war have made little impact on the daily violence of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
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Palestinians carry a wounded man after he was shot during an Israeliattack at Khan Younis refugee camp in the southern Gaza Strip
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Palestinian officials said Israeli undercover soldiers who drove up to a Palestinian guard post in a civilian car shot dead two security men and wounded two others in an exchange of fire near the Jewish settlement of Netzarim.
An Israeli army spokesman had no immediate comment.
Earlier, an Israeli armored force backed by helicopter gunships raided the Khan Younis refugee camp in the southern Gaza Strip, adjacent to the army base hit by the mortar bombs.
Hospital officials said some 20 Palestinians were wounded by a missile fired by an Apache helicopter. Witnesses said Israeli bulldozers destroyed four houses before the force withdrew.
An Israeli military source said the operation was aimed at curtailing mortar bomb attacks on army positions and Jewish settlements in the area.
The violence erupted ahead of US-arranged talks which Palestinian officials said were planned for Saturday between Israeli Prime Minister Mr Ariel Sharon and his new reformist Palestinian counterpart Mr Mahmoud Abbas on a peace "road map."
The militant Islamic group Hamas, spearheading a 31-month-old Palestinian uprising for statehood and opposition to the "road map," said it fired the mortar bombs into the base located in the Jewish settlement of Neve Dekelim.
In a separate incident, three Israelis were slightly hurt when a homemade Qassam rocket fired from the Gaza Strip slammed into a factory warehouse in Sderot, a southern Israeli town near Sharon's ranch, security officials said.