Israeli jets and helicopter gunships resumed Monday morning attacks on Palestinian targets in Gaza Strip. The Israeli missiles were directed at the main security complex in Palestinian-ruled Gaza City, eyewitnesses said.
Monday's raids on Gaza came in two waves about 30 minutes apart, with helicopters and F-16 warplanes firing seven missiles at the Saraya security and prison compound.
Palestinian hospital officials quoted by AFP reported at least 25 people had been injured.
Meanwhile, Israeli forces were prepared Monday for possible invasion into Palestinian cities along the West Bank's Green Line border, in response to future firings of Qassam rockets from those areas, or as a preventative measure to head off such firings.
Israeli security sources said that the military response to Sunday's Be'er Sheva shooting and to the firing of the rockets would be harsh, but would at this stage not include irreversible steps against the Palestinian Authority.
"The operation must make this clear to the Palestinians: we will not abide turning rocket firings into a routine," a security source said. The Israeli operation is projected to include taking over a area of territory under formal PA control, close to sites from which rockets have been launched.
Israeli soldiers and tanks briefly raided the Palestinian-ruled West Bank city of Nablus before dawn Monday, clashing with gunmen some 200 meters from the Palestinian Authority headquarters in the center of the city.
Arafat
Meanwhile, in an interview with the BBC, Palestinian Yasser Arafat said the Israeli government could not defeat the Palestinian people and must deal with him because he is their elected leader.
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has recently declared he wants to work with an alternative Palestinian leadership. He held talks with top Palestinian officials Ahmed Qorei (Abu Ala) and Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen). But Arafat said that Qorei and Abbas are "my colleagues" and "in the same boat". "[The Israelis] have to deal with the Palestinian people, who elected Yasser Arafat and who will elect after Arafat any leader, any president," he said.
Arafat said he was doing all he could to control the militants. "No-one can ask me to do more than I am doing because I am doing 100% effort, but no-one can give 100% results, including the most important superpower in the world, America."
The Palestinian leader also said he was sure that, sooner or later, his people would have their own state.
On Saturday, Arafat strongly emphasized that the Palestinian people would continue their struggle for freedom, regardless of the ongoing Israeli aggression.
Addressing reporters at his Ramallah office, the President said that, ''the continued and repeated Israeli military escalation against our masses, whether by what they called Operation Hell or Thorn Field ... will give the Palestinians more strength, more steadfastness and insistence to continue the Palestinian legitimate struggle.''
Larsen
Israel is responsible for regional security deterioration, said United Nations special Middle East envoy Terje Larsen, according to the Jerusalem Post.
As soon as Israel declared Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat irrelevant, he became very relevant, added Larsen.
The special envoy also condemned Israel's retaliatory F-16 bombing attack Sunday night in Gaza city, in which two United Nations employees were reportedly amongst those injured. (Albawaba.com)
© 2002 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
