Posted on 06/20/2006 11:38:15 AM PDT by West Coast Conservative
Three Palestinian children were killed Tuesday night during a botched IAF missile strike on a car driving in the crowded Jebaliya refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip. An additional 13 Palestinians were wounded in the missile strike which the IDF said had targeted an Al Aksa Martyrs Brigades terror cell.
The dead were identified as five-year-old Mohammed Roka, and two girls ages 7 and 16, said Dr. Jumma Fatah of Shifa Hospital in Gaza City.
The terrorists, witnesses said, succeeded in escaping the car before the blast. Among the wounded were five children, doctors said, including a 7-year-boy in serious condition. The car exploded on a narrow street in the crowded refugee camp. The front of the car was badly damaged, but the back was intact.
Hundreds of angry Palestinians gathered around the vehicle, shouting slogans. Khalil Roka, a cousin of the dead boy, said he was sitting in front of his car repair shop while the children played in front of the house nearby. He said he saw a red flash as the car exploded, and the children were hit.
Meanwhile Tuesday, security officials said that Defense Minister Amir Peretz intended to give a green light to the IDF in the coming days to launch a massive air operation against Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip. On Tuesday, six rockets were fired at Israeli targets in the western Negev.
"The operation will happen," one official in Peretz's office said. "We do not care if there are 30 Kassams or six Kassams a day since our goal is to completely stop the rocket fire altogether."
The IDF operation, sources said, would most probably not include a ground incursion into the Gaza Strip but would mostly be carried out by the IAF in continuous air strikes on Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip.
Speaking at the World Zionist Conference in Jerusalem on Tuesday, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert hinted to Israel's intention to escalate military operations on the Gaza front. Expressing his empathy for the residents of Sderot and the Negev, Olmert said: "No one knows the pain, the fear, and the uncertainty that you're feeling more than I do."
"I know it is difficult and painful," he continued. |I feel for the father who sends his child to school without knowing where the next Kassam might fall," he continued, promising that Israel would take harsher measure than ever against any parties responsible for launching Kassams. "No one has immunity. No matter what he does or what group he's associated with."
IDF sources said that the Al Aksa terror cell targeted Tuesday night was in the midst of planning several different terror attacks against Israel and was involved in Kassam rocket fire on the western Negev. The IDF expressed regret for the harm caused to innocent civilians but stressed that it would continue targeting terror cells in the Gaza Strip.
"Responsibility for the continued rocket fire against Israel lies on the shoulders of the Palestinian Authority and the Hamas government," the IDF said. "We are determined to continue targeting terror cells without any consideration to which group the terrorists are associated with."
Earlier Tuesday, PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas called on armed Palestinian groups to stop firing rockets against Israel, warning that they would be responsible for any Israeli retaliation, an official said.
"Chairman Abbas called on all military groups in Gaza to stop launching rockets at Israel and to fully comply with the truce with Israel," said Abbas aide Nabil Abu Rdeneh. "Chairman Abbas holds any group and any faction that violates the truce fully responsible for the destruction and demolitions and victims that will result because of any Israeli imminent aggression."
Also Tuesday, operations at the Gaza Strip's border crossing with Egypt were suspended briefly in response to a security alert in the area. European monitors at the Rafah crossing asked the Palestinians operating the passage to stop operations until the security alert was lifted, said a spokesman for the European monitors, Julio De La Guardia. The alert was withdrawn within 30 minutes, De La Guardia said. Receiving the same terror alert, the IDF closed the Kerem Shalom crossing into the Gaza Strip.
Sad.
Muslims are such cowards!
Car swarm time.
}:-)4
Always tragic when kids get in the way of these operations. Unavoidable, though, I suppose.
Palestinian Car Swarms --- One of the most vile, demented things a human could ever see. It's right up there with recreational cannibalism.
Sad?
My sympathy quotient for moslems is rapidly being depleted.
My well ran dry a long time ago.
Either way, it is the "palestinian" and sandmaggot method of choice for getting the AP and other MSM to write up a big "Jenin massacre" story...
Give it a rest.
My Give-A-Damn metter broke at around the time the suicide bomber blew himself up in the Sbarro Pizzaria in Jerusalem.
This is a "useful idiot" statement. This does not happen accidentally. It is deliberately arranged.
The kids never "get in the way". They are placed there.
What is sad is that the Palestinians themselves are responsible for this. If you have not read the latest Charles Krauthammer column, you really should.
As he usually does, puts the wholes situation right in perspective. Must Read
The Palestinian disease: Who Is to Blame for Grief on a Beach?
http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/krauthammer1.asp
bmp
In most cases I would tend to agree. However, it's hard to look at the children of Palestine and forget the hatred of America they are taught from their birth. Those children killed may have very well have been future suicide bombers. Either way, death may have been their fate. It's just a matter of when, not "if."
This is another sad effect of terrorist activity - the brainwashing of innocents.
Show me where on this forum I support the Palestinians or even use the word "accidental". You can't.
Three less future terrorists.
Fixed it.
Well, Mr. pottymouth, I don't have to or even need to. Your choice of words, "...get in the way" is the next best thing.
Don't start none, won't be none.
But since you've shown your lack of reason I'll feel free to ignore you now.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.