Israel Widens Its Attacks on Militants, Killing Two

Widening its confrontation with Palestinian militant groups, Israel on Tuesday staged a missile strike in the northern Gaza Strip that killed a commander of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade and a senior Hamas operative.

In an unrelated clash, an Israeli soldier was killed before dawn today in the northern West Bank -- the first such fatality in more than four months. The Israeli army said an elite paratrooper unit came under fire from Palestinian gunmen in the village of Marakeh, southwest of the town of Jenin.

Hamas, which until now had stayed on the sidelines of a blood feud between Israel and another militant faction, Islamic Jihad, vowed it would take revenge for the missile strike. So did the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, which claims loyalty to the Palestinian Authority’s ruling Fatah movement.

Israel last week declared a broad offensive against Palestinian militants after a suicide bombing carried out by Islamic Jihad killed five Israelis in an open-air market in northern Israel. In the last week, Israeli forces have killed 13 Palestinians, about two-thirds of them combatants who for the most part were from Islamic Jihad.

The flare-up of violence has clouded prospects for a resumption of negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians in the wake of Israel’s withdrawal of troops and Jewish settlers from the Gaza Strip.

Palestinian militant spokesmen and the Israeli military identified the two men slain in Tuesday’s missile strike as Hassan Madhoun, a senior commander for the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade in northern Gaza, and Fawzi Karah, a local leader of Hamas’ armed wing. Both lived north of Gaza City in the Jabaliya refugee camp, near which the missile attack took place.

The army said in a statement that Madhoun, whom it blamed for masterminding attacks that had killed at least 20 Israelis, was the intended target of the strike.

Among the attacks or attempted attacks in which Madhoun was implicated was a notorious case earlier this year in which a Palestinian female medical patient was arrested with an explosives belt as she tried to cross from Gaza into Israel. She confessed to having been ordered to blow herself up at the Israeli hospital where she was treated. The case sparked widespread outrage in Israel.

Madhoun also played a role in a suicide bombing at the Israeli port of Ashdod last year that killed 10 Israelis, the army said.

In Tuesday’s missile strike, a pilotless drone fired on a car in which the two men were riding, incinerating the vehicle and killing them instantly. At least half a dozen bystanders were injured.

The attack took place shortly before 5 p.m., as the narrow alleyways of the camp were packed with people shopping for their iftar, the fast-breaking evening meal taken during the holy month of Ramadan.

A motorcade carrying Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas passed the site shortly before the strike, Palestinian officials said.

The Palestinian Authority has condemned the militant groups for firing rockets toward Israel from Gaza and staging other attacks, but also has been sharply critical of the continuing Israeli offensive. The Palestinians’ chief negotiator, Saeb Erekat, likened Tuesday’s strike to pouring fuel on a fire.

Hamas, the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade and Islamic Jihad issued statements saying the killings would bring bloody reprisals.

At the hospital where the men’s bodies were taken, masked gunmen fired volleys into the air and chanted, “Revenge, revenge!”

“We swear there will be an earthquake of retaliation,” an Al Aqsa commander who goes by the nom de guerre of Abu Khalid Hijazi told reporters.

Earlier in the day, Israel’s security Cabinet, made up of senior officials in the military and intelligence sphere, approved in principle a proposal to open the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt.

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s government has come under international criticism for not reaching an accord with the Palestinians allowing for passage of people and goods into and out of Gaza.

The Egyptian-brokered proposal still requires the final approval of the full Israeli Cabinet.

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Times special correspondent Fayed abu Shammalah in Gaza City contributed to this report.