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Palestinians fire on Israeli protesters
(AP)
Updated: 2005-08-03 09:06
Palestinians fired rockets Tuesday at a gathering of thousands of Israeli
settlers protesting the upcoming Gaza withdrawal, but missed, killing instead a
3-year-old Palestinian boy and wounding nine other Palestinians in Gaza,
Associated Press reported.
Witnesses said militants fired three rockets at the demonstration in the
Israeli town of Sderot. Two of the rockets fell in Palestinian areas and the
third fell in an open field near Sderot.
Among the wounded were five children, aged 4 to 11, including four children
of Hisham Abdel Razek, a senior official in the ruling Fatah party and a former
Palestinian Cabinet minister. Abdel Razek's wife was also injured.
The dead boy was identified as Yasser Adnan Ashkar, who was killed when one
of the stray rockets hit his family's home in Beit Hanoun, northeast of Gaza
City. His 11-year-old brother was in critical condition. Abdel Razek's family
was visiting at the time, witnesses said.
A few minutes after the rockets were fired, an explosion was heard outside
the Gaza City house of a former Palestinian Cabinet minister, witnesses said. No
one was hurt, police said. On Monday, a blast damaged a wall outside the home of
the Palestinian Authority's attorney general in Gaza City.
Both officials have been picked by the parliament to investigate widespread
corruption in the Palestinian Authority.
In a separate attack Tuesday, Palestinian militants fired a rocket at an
Israeli convoy traveling to the isolated settlement of Netzarim, settlers and
the army said. There were no reports of injuries.
Militant attacks against Israelis had dropped off after a February truce
between Israel and the Palestinians. In recent weeks, however, as the Israeli
withdrawal from Gaza approaches, militants have stepped up attacks to try to
portray the Israeli pullout as a military victory for the Palestinians.
Although the Israelis gathered in Sderot had pledged a peaceful protest,
settler leaders said they planned to defy a military order and march to Gaza's
settlements Wednesday.
More than 15,000 police and soldiers took up positions in southern Israel to
prevent the marchers from reaching Gaza, which has been declared a closed
military zone.
The protest march would be the settlers' second effort in two weeks to breech
the barricades preventing them from getting into the Gush Katif settlement bloc
in southern Gaza. If they fall short again, it would be a devastating blow to
the protest movement.
""It is impossible to stop the masses of Israel who have only one goal, to
reach Gush Katif and overturn this cruel decree," Gaza settler leader Avner
Shimoni told Channel 2 TV Tuesday.
Some of the protesters in Sderot conceded they had little chance to stop the
pullout.
"It seems that it is too late," said Alain Bismuth, 40, from the northern
town of Haifa. He said he came simply to show there are many Israelis opposed to
the plan.
Others still had hope.
"Everything we do changes things," said Shmuel Lax, 30, of Neve Tsuf.
Police estimated 10,000 people were at the rally.
Early Wednesday, police and soldiers blocked a group of women from West Bank
settlements who circumvented several roadblocks and approached Gaza. After a
tense, noisy confrontation, they were bundled onto a bus and driven away.
Israel plans to pull out of all 21 Gaza Strip settlements and four in the
West Bank in mid-August, uprooting about 9,000 settlers. The government says
more than half the settlers have agreed to leave voluntarily and expect more to
follow before the withdrawal date.
More than 200,000 settlers live in other parts of the West Bank, and their
leaders fear the Gaza pullout could be the beginning of further withdrawals from
land claimed by the Palestinians. Observant Jews believe the West Bank is
promised to the Jews in the Bible.
On Sunday, the Cabinet will formally vote on the evacuation of the first
group of settlements, a government official said. In March, the Cabinet approved
the overall withdrawal plan, but agreed to vote again separately before the
evacuation of each of four groups of settlements. The pullout is expected to
pass easily.
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