GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip, March 6, 2008
Palestinian Militants Ambush Israeli Army
Attack On Military Vehicle At Gaza Border Kills Soldier; Rocket Hits Southern Israel
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The attack, and a rocket strike on a house in southern Israel later in the day, raised the possibility of a fresh round of violence between Hamas militants in Gaza and the Israeli military.
The incidents came just two days after Israel ended an offensive that killed more than 120 Palestinians - and one day after a visit by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who convinced the Palestinians to drop their boycott of peace talks with Israel.
CBS News correspondent Robert Berger reports that with Israel promising to retaliate for all attacks from Gaza, and the Palestinians demanding restraint, it may be hard for either side to re-launch the negotiations as they vowed to do when Rice was in Jerusalem.
Senior Israeli military officers held an emergency meeting to plot a response, officials said.
Palestinian witnesses said a large explosion tore through the jeep, which was on the Israeli side of the border fence near the Kissufim crossing into central Gaza, and set it on fire.
Several other army vehicles, along with an army helicopter, arrived to rescue the wounded, but came under fire, the witnesses said. Military officials said one of the wounded was in serious condition.
Later Thursday, a rocket fired from Gaza slammed into a house in southern Israeli. Emergency crews were rushing to the scene. There was no immediate word on casualties. Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said the attack occurred in Sderot, the southern Israeli border town that has repeatedly been hit by rocket fire in recent years.
Islamic Jihad, a tiny Islamic militant group with links to Iran, claimed responsibility for the ambush and the rocket attack. Hamas, the larger militant group that rules Gaza, said its men also participated in the border attack on the military vehicle.
Abu Ahmad, a spokesman for Islamic Jihad, said the attack was revenge for an Israeli strike a day earlier that killed one of the group's commanders in southern Gaza.
"We are sending our message to all the Zionist criminals," he said. "Your threats to target the leaders of resistance ... won't scare us. We are going to continue our resistance and holy war, and we will continue to rain rockets on your colonies until we make them ghost towns."
For months, Israel has been operating in Gaza against Palestinian militants who fire rockets into southern Israel. Last week, it launched a ground and air offensive in response to especially heavy rocket fire, including several barrages that reached as far as Ashkelon, a city of 120,000, 11 miles north of Gaza.
Israel withdrew its ground forces from northern Gaza on Tuesday, leaving a wide scene of destruction in its wake. Palestinian medical officials say more than half of the dead were civilians. Israel accuses Hamas militants of using civilians for cover.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas suspended peace talks with Israel earlier this week to protest the violence in Gaza. Despite Abbas' rivalry with Hamas, Israeli military action is so unpopular with the Palestinian public that it undermines his authority and makes it difficult for him to negotiate with Israel.
Hamas violently seized control of Gaza from Abbas' forces last June. Abbas wields no control in Gaza, but continues to claim to represent the area's 1.4 million people.
Fast Fact
On Wednesday, Abbas said he would not return to the negotiating table until Israel reached a truce in Gaza. However, under pressure from visiting Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Abbas backtracked and agreed to resume talks, though it remained unclear when negotiations will restart.A coalition of eight British human rights groups says the humanitarian situation in Gaza is at its worst point since Israel captured the territory in 1967.
Israel has been negotiating with Abbas, a moderate who rules from the West Bank, since last November. At the same time, it continues to battle the Hamas militants who control the Gaza Strip. Israel has also imposed a painful economic embargo on Gaza, causing widespread hardship in the already impoverished area.
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's office announced Wednesday that Israel would maintain its pressure on Hamas. Olmert did leave the door open to an unofficial truce with Hamas.
"If there is no rocket fire at Israel, there won't be Israeli attacks on Gaza," he told reporters.
In other violence Thursday, Israeli forces attacked a rocket-launching site in the northern Gaza Strip, killing one militant, Palestinian medics said. The army said it had carried out an air strike on a launching site.
Israel's blockade of Gaza has led to shortages of basic staples, fuel and electricity. On Thursday, a coalition of eight British human rights groups claimed the humanitarian situation in Gaza is at its worst point since Israel captured the territory in 1967. Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005, but continues to control its borders and airspace.
The report said that more than 1.1 million people, about 80 percent of Gaza's residents, are now dependent on food aid, up from 63 percent in 2006, unemployment is close to 40 percent. Close to 70 percent of the 110,000 workers employed in the private sector have lost their jobs.
It also said that hospitals are suffering from power cuts of up to 12 hours a day, and the water and sewage systems were close to collapse, 10 million to 12 million gallons of sewage pouring into the sea daily.
"Israel has the right and obligation to protect its citizens, but as the occupying power in Gaza it also has a legal duty to ensure that Gazans have access to food, clean water, electricity and medical care," said Amnesty International UK Director Kate Allen, one of groups behind the report.
Israel's Defense Ministry rejected the report, blaming the militant Hamas rulers of Gaza for the hardships. It also said medicine and other humanitarian supplies continue to flow into Gaza.
The 16-page report - sponsored by Amnesty, along with CARE International UK, CAFOD, Christian Aid, Medecins du Monde UK, Oxfam, Save the Children UK and Trocaire - calls on the British government to exert greater pressure on Israel and to reverse its policy on not negotiating with Gaza's Hamas rulers.
© MMVIII, CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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Obama's Message To Africa
they have their land taken from them, forced into concentration camps, and now they are being starved to death.....
If the Hamas terrorism does not stop, what will happen will be very costly for all of the Palestinian.
To those who know the truth but choose to look the other, I''ll say ''rest in turmoil'' as you have helped Hamas in murdering innocent people.
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Posted by notblue at 11:17 AM : Mar 06, 2008
+ report abuse
I believe, if you check the Record, they WERE onboard BEFORE Sir Lies-A-Lot and his chest pounding, you are either with us or against us garbage. In fact WE, the United States had an approval rating in the Middle East and amoung Arab Nations of something line 75% before the Neo Nazi''s came along. Right now it''s at 15% and dropping. Sieg Heil Bush!
Posted by singinrick
It is that kind of garbage that keeps this conflict going on forever.
You are nutty as a fruitcake. How are things in TX?
This never happens with you on here jimmy. I''''m stunned.
Things in TX are swell. Pretty cool weather wise here today actually. But I don''''t mind.
Posted by singinrick
I would not want to seem out of character, then you might worry and start praying for me :)
I live in Oregon, in the high desert eastern area. Sunny and 50 F today. Very nice.
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Posted by notblue at 12:49 PM : Mar 06, 2008
notblue, don''t bother with McVet, he blames everything on bush, this proves it. this conflict was going on well before bush. Mcvet has a screw loose and needs some serious help.
Hey Rick Meese how can you live in Texas and Ohio at the same time? I thought you were a big buckeye fan.
Now that I know you are in the air force I see why you are so adamant in your views. Even though we disagree on most everything I do appreciate anyone who serves the country. I am glad you are not making the decisions, because we would be bombing the *** out of everyone. So if Bush were not your commander and chief then would you admit he is a chowder head?
I do not agree with hardly anything that this administration does and if you are being paid to post this stuff it isn''t right. I care about America as much as you do and I think the we are right no matter what and they are wrong no matter what is part of the problem. Also the fact that the media is very selective in what they release is a problem, it never tells the whole story. I want to know the whole truth all of the time, and as you can see I am pretty good at finding out details. Once I know the whole story I decide who I feel is right and who is wrong, and I don''t take corporate interests, religion or the President into consideration, just the facts. Now i am also wondering if you are being paid by the military to do psych ops on these message baords how many of the other pro-Israel Buah lackeys are being paid as well. Man it is getting like the soviet Union anymore, you don''t know if your neighbor is a normal guy or a spy.
correct, you are not me, if you recall you and i disagreed on a certain post, care to look it up and prove to ricky that you arent going to stalk him either, he seems to relish in his martyrdom complex....
singinchick is just paranoid.....
of course i''m playing a game, but i do know you are in the air force.
I don''t agree with the jihadists any more then Israel, my point is that when Israel bombs a house or shoots a civilian they are no better then the muslims who kill. It bothers me that so many here think when the Israeli military kills a non-combatent it is ok, just colaterial damage, but when a Palestinian does it it is terrorism. I really don''t care which side wins, the way things are going if Palestine and Israel wiped each other off of the map the world would be better off.
As far as Chavez is concerned, he may be an idiot but was elected by the majority so the CIA should stop trying to kill him and supporting coups against him. His power is slipping if we leave him be he will not last anyway, so what good is it to instigate Columbia into starting another war? That will just mean more innocent people dead. Since you are such a christian why don''t you see that. Do you listen to "My God is an Awsome God" while you hit the little button and the air force drone bombs a residence in Iraq?
Hey we did disagree huh? I was having a bad day.
Turns out all of Ricks info is on google if you put in singinrick. He is in the air force stationsed in Tx, I think Sheppard but i am not sure. I know he speant two years at Wright-Patterson in Ohio working on advanced weapon tech, pretty scary a guy like him works with weapons tech huh?
What I want to know is since he is on here all day if he is being paid by the military to do psych ops?
Singintick is always on here, spewing death for God and Country,
by a keyboard. and hes fond of reporting everyone on here, there is not one person he has not reported, but Thank the stars for Freedom of Speech, he would be the first one to take that right from you if he could......
Hey we did disagree huh? I was having a bad day.
Turns out all of Ricks info is on google if you put in singinrick. He is in the air force stationsed in Tx, I think Sheppard but i am not sure. I know he speant two years at Wright-Patterson in Ohio working on advanced weapon tech, pretty scary a guy like him works with weapons tech huh?
What I want to know is since he is on here all day if he is being paid by the military to do psych ops?
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Posted by killtheliars at 03:10 PM : Mar 06, 2008
God help us!
Exactly! And good question!
Wait ''till this is retracted and it was a crazy jew who did it. Or some Mossad or CIA/al-cia-da krap like Fatah trying to over throw Hamas. Muslims would never attack Priests or a Rabbis. Just the CIA trained Wahabi Turks would do that.
Posted by cfin5 at 07:03 PM : Mar 06, 2008
The attack struck at the heart of Israel''s hard-line religious West Bank settler''s movement
Ah, that explains it. But the rest still stands.
Posted by cfin5 at 07:03 PM : Mar 06, 2008
Still could have been Mossad to enrage the settlers to help the failing IDF. Either or.
Wait ''''till this is retracted and it was a crazy jew who did it. Or some Mossad or CIA/al-cia-da krap like Fatah trying to over throw Hamas. Muslims would never attack Priests or a Rabbis. Just the CIA trained Wahabi Turks would do that.
Posted by zootallures2
This guy is either crazy, a propagandists who know his statements are untrue, or a propagandists who believes his own propaganda. He is a typical Arab apoligists. Blame everything on Israel and nothing on the Arabs. Next, he will tell use that the seminary students shot themselves.
Posted by rhs648 at 08:43 PM : Mar 06, 2008
Well, you crazy barbaric jews said you gonna give Gaza a holocaust, then you can get what the nazi got. It was the brave fighters for good and God from Hizb Allah that killed your chicken witch doctor satanist "rabbis". Who are you to tell me about Israel, you voodoo crack pot. You are a saxon pig. Go home to the fatherland. Not even your own Germans want you.
But they worship a Black Rock that just sits there.
At least you can get some good chicken soup at the seminary school.
But they worship a Black Rock that just sits there.
At least you can get some good chicken soup at the seminary school.
Posted by krotec54 at 11:04 PM : Mar 06, 2008
Won''t that mean you are drinking your sins back in?
You silly thing, you can not drink your sins of the pass back in. maybe a muslim can do that.
Dedicated to zootallures2 and his family-part1:
My God, whom I praise,
do not remain silent,
for people who are wicked and deceitful
have opened their mouths against me;
they have spoken against me with lying
tongues.
With words of hatred they surround me;
they attack me without cause.
In return for my friendship they accuse me,
but I am a man of prayer.
They repay me evil for good,
and hatred for my friendship.
Appoint someone evil to oppose my enemy;
let an accuser stand at his right hand.
When he is tried, let him be found guilty,
and may his prayers condemn him.
May his days be few;
may another take his place of leadership.
May his children be fatherless
and his wife a widow.
May his children be wandering beggars;
may they be driven [a] from their ruined
homes.
May a creditor seize all he has;
may strangers plunder the fruits of his labor.
May no one extend kindness to him
or take pity on his fatherless children.
May his descendants be cut off,
their names blotted out from the next
generation.
May the iniquity of his fathers be remembered
before the LORD;
may the sin of his mother never be blotted
out.
May their sins always remain before the LORD,
that he may blot out their name from the
earth.
For he never thought of doing a kindness,
but hounded to death the poor
and the needy and the brokenhearted.
He loved to pronounce a curse%u2014
may it come on him.
He found no pleasure in blessing%u2014
may it be far from him.
He wore cursing as his garment;
it entered into his body like water,
into his bones like oil.
May it be like a cloak wrapped about him,
like a belt tied forever around him.
May this be the LORD''s payment to my accusers,
to those who speak evil of me.
But you, Sovereign LORD,
help me for your name''s sake;
out of the goodness of your love, deliver me.
Let them know that it is your hand,
that you, LORD, have done it.
While they curse, may you bless;
may those who attack me be put to shame,
but may your servant rejoice.
May my accusers be clothed with disgrace
and wrapped in shame as in a cloak.
With my mouth I will greatly extol the LORD;
in the great throng of worshipers I will
praise him.
For he stands at the right hand of the needy,
to save their lives from those who would
condemn them.
and his wife a widow.
May his children be wandering beggars;
may they be driven [a] from their ruined
homes.
May a creditor seize all he has;
may strangers plunder the fruits of his labor.
May no one extend kindness to him
or take pity on his fatherless children.
May his descendants be cut off,
their names blotted out from the next
generation.
Posted by moses2008 at 05:23 AM : Mar 07, 2008
-If those are the prayers Moses did then, well see it by yourself, you little trash, and Moses are not worth a spit...
-Humbly!
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by grazinggoat
March 8, 2008 1:41 PM PST
- I recently found a nice web site called pubspa.com where you can meet friends who have same interest in beauty care, massage, wellness and spa treatment. Posted by Andyli1004 at 11:40 AM : Mar 08, 2008
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See all 42 Comments-Andyli1004, take moses2008 and drawn him in one of those spas!