Five Jewish settlers and six Israeli soldiers were wounded by Palestinian mortar fire on the southern Gaza Strip settlement bloc of Gush Katif this morning, military sources said.
Later, Israeli forces carried out an incursion into the town of Khan Yunis in southern Gaza. More than 20 armored vehicles, accompanied by bulldozers and given cover by three helicopter gunships, moved into an area near the Jewish settlement of Neve Dekalim and an exchange of fire took place.
An army spokesman said the operation was aimed at cutting off mortar fire coming from the area.
In northern Gaza, Palestinian militants fired home-made Qassem rockets of the type manufactured by the radical Hamas group at the nearby Israeli town of Sderot, slightly wounding three people, Israeli military sources said.
In the West Bank, Israeli troops raided the northern refugee camp of Tulkarem and arrested seven Palestinians, Palestinian security sources said.
The army, which arrested a total of around 20 Palestinians today , also demolished a house belonging to a member Hamas in the nearby town of Qalqilya, the sources said.
The Palestinian sources added that three houses under construction in the northern city of Nablus were also torn down by the army, but a military spokesman said only one building was destroyed. It was being used to store explosives, he said.
During an overnight raid in Zeita village, five kilometres from Tulkarem, troops found two suitcases packed with 20 kilograms of explosives in an abandoned building, an Israeli security source said.
The suitcases were ready for use by two would-be suicide bombers from the radical Islamic Jihad group who were arrested by Israeli security forces last week, he said. Both suitcases were destroyed in a controlled explosion.
Elsewhere, Israel police arrested a wanted Palestinian who was travelling on an Israeli bus. They had been alerted to his presence by the bus driver who grew suspicious.
AFP