ISRAEL: Israel poured tanks and large numbers of troops into the Gaza Strip last night after five more of its soldiers were killed in a second, almost identical, bombing of an armoured personnel carrier (APC) on successive days. Five Palestinians were also killed, amid dramatically escalating violence.
Troops were still scouring Gaza City's Zeitoun neighbourhood for the remains of the six soldiers killed there on Tuesday when the second blast blew apart an APC on the "Philadelphi Road" that runs along the Gaza-Egypt border.
"Gaza has become a second Lebanon," said one Israeli military source, referring to the Hizbullah-style, relentless targeting of Israeli troops that led the army to withdraw from south Lebanon four years ago and that Hamas and Islamic Jihad hope will force a defeated Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip as well. Like Hizbullah, Hamas and Islamic Jihad are supported by Iran.
For the second successive night, Israeli military chiefs held emergency consultations about how to respond to the escalating Gaza death toll, which has now seen 11 soldiers killed in 36 hours, as well as the five members of the Hatuel family gunned down on May 2nd.
That rise, in turn, follows Israel's killing of Hamas leaders Sheikh Yassin and Abd al-Aziz Rantisi, as it sought to weaken the ability of Hamas to mount suicide-bombings in Israel.
For now, the Israeli response seems to be to reinforce the military presence in the Gaza Strip.
Of the five Palestinians killed in yesterday's fighting, at least three were armed gunmen, and at least one was a civilian. Four of the five died when an Israeli assault helicopter fired the second of two missiles near a mosque in Zeitoun.
"We understand it hit civilians \," said an army spokesman, "but [the men targeted] are carrying explosives in civilian areas."
"This is war," another military source said, adding, however, that Israel was unlikely to launch a wide assault in the Gaza Strip - similar to the massive incursions of spring 2002 in the West Bank - because the death toll from fighting in the crowded neighbourhoods of Gaza would be unacceptably high.
The similarities between the two APC bombings in the past two days were almost uncanny. In yesterday's incident, as in Tuesday's, an explosive device that was detonated alongside an APC proved fatal to all the soldiers inside because the vehicle was itself carrying large quantities of explosives.
On Tuesday, the APC blown apart had been returning from an operation to destroy weapons factories in Zeitoun; yesterday, the APC targeted was carrying explosives used to blow up tunnels, dug beneath the Gaza-Egypt border, through which Hamas and Islamic Jihad smuggle arms and ammunition.
In yesterday's incident, the APC was hit as it drove to assist two wounded soldiers on an Israeli army tractor that had been damaged in a smaller explosion.
The rising death toll in Gaza comes amid political turmoil in Israel following May 2nd's rejection by members of the governing Likud party of Prime Minister Mr Ariel Sharon's plan to withdraw unilaterally from the Strip, where 8,000 Jewish settlers live among 1.3 million Palestinians.
Leaders of the Israeli left are demanding ever more vociferously that Israel pull out as soon as possible - "Every soldier who dies in Gaza dies in vain," said the left-wing Israeli politician Mr Yossi Sarid on Tuesday. On the Israeli right, by contrast, demands are mounting for heavier military action to try and deter future attacks.
While troops now search for soldiers' remains both in Zeitoun and in the Rafah refugee camp area, alongside the scene of last night's attack (where 15 tanks were reportedly deployed last night), leaders of Islamic Jihad, which has claimed responsibility for both the attacks, spoke of a deal to return body parts to Israel. In exchange, said Khadir Habeeb, a Gaza-based Islamic Jihad spokesman, Israel would pull out of Zeitoun and turn over bodies it holds of Palestinian attackers.
Israel's Foreign Minister Mr Silvan Shalom said that no such deal was being entertained, and that Israel was demanding "the return of the soldiers remains, period."
Behind the scenes, however, Red Cross and Egyptian mediators have been negotiating terms.