Early this morning, two Israeli soldiers were wounded, one critically, when a roadside bomb exploded and hit an Israeli military jeep near the Matahen checkpoint, south of Deir El Balah. The jeep was patrolling near the Netzer Hazani settlement in south Gaza. No militant faction or group has claimed responsibility.

The Israeli occupation forces immediately closed the Salahedin Road, the main north-south artery through Gaza, and closed the Abu Holi and Matahen checkpoints, causing huge traffic jams. Eyewitnesses also report one citizen arrested in Khan Younis.

In a separate incident north of Khan Younis, four militants and two civilians were wounded near the Al Amal neighborhood while trying to fire homemade rockets at the Israeli Gani Tal settlement. This makeshift ordnance contains organic material and chemical fertilizer and becomes unstable in very hot weather, making premature detonation more likely. The Palestinian Interior Ministry once more urged all the militant groups to respect the truce.

A final act of violence — which may have profound effects on all of Gaza — took place in the Israeli seaside resort town of Netanya where an 18-year-old suicide bomber from the West Bank detonated his explosives on a busy street corner outside a shopping mall, killing two young women along with himself and wounding as many as 50 people. Some media reports say the Islamic Jihad faction is claiming responsibility; others say nobody has claimed responsibility for the attack. Palestinian President Abbas was quick to condemn the suicide attack. Reuters reported the bomber was Ahmed Abu Khalil, 18, from Tulkarm in the West Bank, and said in his video statement: "We reiterate our commitment to calm, but we have to retaliate for Israeli violations." Of course, if the Israeli army answers with overwhelming force, almost certainly they will say they "have to" retaliate. Throughout Gaza, people are bracing for the almost inevitable border closures and the resulting hardships.

Rafah leads Tawjihi exam results.

There were shouts of joy as mothers passed out sweets, car horns honked, tears of happiness were shed throughout Rafah as the Tawjihi exam results brought the amazing news that besieged Rafah had the highest exam scores in all of Gaza. The Tawjihi exams — an ordeal, milestone, and rite of passage — are taken by all graduating secondary school students and a passing grade is necessary to go on to university. Despite the incursion and frequent shelling, Rafah students had the highest scores in both the Art and Science sections, taking the top nine places. Many of the high-scoring students come from the devastated neighborhoods on the Gaza/Egypt border. Ghada Shabana, from the Shafa Amar School for Girls, had the highest mark in the Art Stream, 98.2, while Safa Alghoul of the Al Aqdasia School for Girls scored highest in Science with 99.5.

Preparing for the Tawjihi exams often involves the whole family, as radios and TVs are silenced for weeks on end and all the family members do their utmost to give the studying seniors the peace and quiet they need. Even when there is an attack nearby, most students refuse to let it disrupt their work. If the power is cut, they continue by candlelight. If the shelling is too close for it to be safe to show a light, they shutter the windows and, if necessary, learn to ignore stifling heat. For so many parents, students, and teachers in Rafah, preserving normalcy, refusing to let the Occupation invade even our minds and studies, is our own rejection of oppression, our own victory over injustice.

7 July 05

A number of Israeli bulldozers and tanks invaded the western part of Rafah Refugee Camp, and left only after heavy shooting. Essam Al Abed, 21, was taken to Abu Yousuf Al Najjar hospital where doctors reported he had two bullet wounds in his left leg.

In the Tal Al Sultan neighborhood, also in western Rafah, twenty well-equipped Israeli soldiers, backed by armored vehicles, came from the nearby Israeli settlements and tried to enter the neighborhood. Gunfire was exchanged with militants.

In the Al Mawasi camp, which is cut off from the sea and from the rest of Gaza by Israeli settlements, settlers, backed up by anti-disengagement supporters from Israeli and overseas, tried to occupy houses in Al Mawasi and burn the Palestinians' fishing boats. The Israeli army separated the scuffling groups, but according to witnesses and the press, beat the Palestinians while dealing fairly gently with the settlers.

That same week end, some forty militants from the al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade, the armed wing of the ruling Fatah party, took over the Palestine Legislative Council office building in Rafah. Although they were masked and carried rifles, their four-hour "occupation" was non-violent. The action was a protest against the authorities' foot-dragging on fulfilling its promise to find jobs for the militants.

Late in June, a Bedouin soldier serving in the Israeli Army was convicted of manslaughter in the death of photographer and peace activist Tom Hurndall in Rafah two years ago, and received a 20-year prison sentence. Hurndall's father, a British attorney, conducted his own investigation of events in Rafah and had the backing of the British government in pushing for a serious investigation. After the verdict, he told reporters that the case had underlined a culture of impunity for Israeli soldiers operating in Gaza. "We are concerned that there is a policy which seems to be prevalent in Gaza among the Israeli soldiers and army that they feel able to shoot civilians really without any accountability whatsoever. So there are two issues here: one, the apparent tacit policy that seems to be in place that the Palestinian civilians are fair game; and that there is no accountability."

The Israeli human rights group Btselem said that innocent Palestinian victims were much less likely to receive justice, saying that Israeli forces had killed at least 1,722 Palestinians not involved in hostilities but in only two cases were soldiers convicted of causing the death of a Palestinian.

Rafah residents, particularly those in areas near the Israeli settlements, are braced for difficulties during the coming evacuation, as at least some of the settlers seem bent on offering violent resistance. Shooting from the settlements toward Palestinian civilians is a common occurrence. No one is sure if the Israeli army will seal off Gaza to prevent the settlers from gathering reinforcements, but border closures always mean shortages and hardship for everyone in Gaza.

26 May 05

Israeli Occupation Forces, once more violate what is called “Calm down” period by killing Ahmed Robin Barhoom, 24, who was shot by an Israeli Army sniper close to the place in Yebna Camp. Other Palestinian member of Islamic Jihad has been assassinated by Israeli helicopter at Khan youies Camp, other three people were injured in the same hit.

This same week, the famous Brazilian soccer player Ronaldo visited Ramallah in the West Bank and Tel Aviv on a mission to promote peace and sports. His plans to visit Gaza as well were aborted by the Israeli militar y closure. Few realize what a passion soccer is in Palestine—it requires nothing more than a soccer ball, a little open ground. A Rafah 12-year-old, Hamad al Nairib, wrote to the sports star urging him to visit the children of Rafah "where all the people love you." Some might call Hamad lucky; he was present at the peaceful demonstration in Rafah a year ago which the Israelis shelled. A number of Hamad's friends were killed that day; he himself lost his left leg. Hamad had been a fervent soccer player with dreams of becoming "the Ronaldo of Palestine." Maybe it isn't fair to expect a brilliant athlete also to be a diplomat, politician, and PR expert—we'll never know how much or little of an effort Ronaldo made to persuade the Israeli army to let him into Gaza. But Hamad and his friends were disappointed yet again

At early dawn today, the Israeli occupation forces manning a military checkpoint in Tal Al Sultan area, in the western part of Rafah opened fire at random towards the residents' houses in the area. There seemed to the residents to be no reason for t he Shooting Later that day, two children in the Al Z'arba area in the southern part of Rafah, were injured when an object left on the street by Israeli soldiers exploded. Doctors at Abu Yousef Al Najjar Hospital said Ahmed Zaid Zuraob and Mohammed Ibraheem Zurob each had several shrapnel wounds in various parts of their bodies.

13 May 05

The Fatah faction came out top Friday in municipal polls in the occupied territories, but Islamist group Hamas beat the party of Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas in four out of five major cities.

Thursday's elections in more than 80 municipalities throughout the Gaza Strip and West Bank had been seen as test of Hamas's popularity two months before the fundamentalist group contests its first legislative polls.

Preliminary results gave Fatah control of more than 50 municipalities and Hamas 28. The remaining councils fell to independents.

But Hamas, triumphing in four of the five major towns where the polls took place, proclaimed a wider victory.

Rafah and Bureij refugee camp in Gaza, along with Qalqiliya in the West Bank as Hamas wins.

Electoral officials said Hamas also won the sprawling town of Beit Lahya in northern Gaza, which like the impoverished Rafah has been radicalised after suffering the brunt of the almost five-year intifada.

But a senior Fatah official cast doubt over the Hamas victory in Rafah and the Bureij camp, ahead of the full, official results due on Sunday.

"We have requested a recount of votes i n Rafah and Bureij. At the moment, we do not accept these results," central committee of elections member Abdallah al-Franji told a news conference.

In the West B ank, Biblical town of Bethlehem, Hamas won six out of seven council seats reserved for Muslims, with the seventh going to Islamic Jihad, said electoral officials. Christians control the council with eight seats.

Tayeb Abdelrahim, another Fatah central committee member and close aide to Abbas, told reporters the results proved his faction "remained the biggest force on the Palestinian street".

Late Thursday, Abbas welcomed what he called "the transparent and free democratic atmosphere in which these elections took place".

A senior Israeli official said the ballot was a domestic Palestinian affair but reiterated that Hamas's participation "conferred no legitimacy" on the group, which remains blacklisted by Washingto n as a terrorist organisation.

"Democracy and terrorism do not go together," the source said.

Thursday's voting in mostly small towns and villages was the second of three staggered rounds of municipal elections in the occupied territories.

Overall turnout was put at around 82 percent. Of 2,519 candidates standing for election, 399 are women.

29 April 05

The controversial ionizing radiation screening device used by the Israeli Army to screen all Palestinians passing through the Gaza/Egypt border crossing at Rafah apparently claimed its first victim when Fatmah Abu Ebaed, a woman of 56, died during the screening. Over a month ago, doctors in Gaza City raised the alarm about the possible harmful effects& ugrave;immediate and long-termùon the Palestinians forced to enter the lead-shielded room for multiple screening photographs taken by an Israeli Army operator safely outside the room. They had seen a number of cases of headache, dizziness, and nausea experienced by passengers soon after screening, and also expressed concern about long-term effects, especially on children, the elderly, pregnant women, and medical patients. After the Israeli group, Physicians for Human Rights, and other human rights groups joined the protest, the IOF agreed to stop using the machineùthen quietly resumed forcing all travelers to pass through the so-called "death chamber" a few weeks later. The Palestinian government department that controls Rafah crossing, in an unprecedented move, shut the crossing for a few hours this week to protest Israeli foot-dragging. The Palestinian Authority issued a formal request to the World Health Organization to send a multi-national group of experts to evaluate the safety of the machine.

Human rights organizations have also protested the fact that these scr eening machines produce a nude image on the screening monitor. Worldwide, people of many backgrounds and cultures find such a procedure offensive, but it is especially humiliating to observant Moslems whose ingrained aversion to casual nudity is a matter of both custom and religious law.

Palestinian Minister of Health Al Wuheidi said today that the Ministry of Health has not yet managed to collect enough solid data about the screening device the Israeli forces are using at Rafah border terminal, as well as the one used at Erez Checkpoint, in the north of the Gaza Strip. But, he added, "What we saw with our own eyes during our traveling was shocking. We asked some colleagues who were screened and they told us that they were photographed by the device more than 10 times, indicated by the ticking of the camera. Orders are given to the screened individual by a microphone inside the room. The ticking sounds suggest the use of radiation inside the device," the Minister said. He added that the issue was not about the type or quantity of the radiation used; as they don't yet have that inform ation. It was rather the duration of exposure to radiation, stressed Dr. Wuheidi.

"The preliminary information we obtained indicate that they can take photos penetrating the skin into the deep layers of the body, reaching to the bones. Even if we hypothetically assume there is no harm in that, we are looking at an appalling infringement of the Palestinian people's human rights and religious codes," Dr. Wuheidi said.

The Minister said that he had recently heard that Israeli forces had a pregnant Israeli soldier walk through the device to convince the Palestinian travelers it was safe. Dr. Wuheidi dismissed this as a farce, since the Israeli Army routinely gives its soldiers maternity leave late in pregnancy. "Any amount of radiation can affect growing fetuses and might cause mutations during the first four months of pregnancy," said the health minister. Even worse, many Palestinian women who travel abroad while pregnant are seeking specialized treatment for complications of pregnancy, so are at unusually high risk .

A similar screening machine is in use at the Erez checkpoint, where Palestinian workers in the industrial zone must cross twice daily. Dr. Wuheidi said that the Ministry of Health will start drawing blood and tissue samples from the workers passing through Erez and examine them thoroughly, then draw new samples a month later to check for negative effects of repeated exposure to this screening device. Early in April, the Erez checkpoint opened a new "secondary" tunnel for press, foreign visitors and members of NGOs allowed into Gaza, which is completely hidden from the area where Palestinians cross. So there is now no chance that press or international visitors can see exactly what happens to Palestinian travelers.

Ironically, while the Palestinian authorities shut down Rafah crossing in protest, thousands more Gazans have been stranded at the closed Abu Holi checkpoint in the central Gaza Strip. There have been hundreds of Israeli settlers at Gush Katif staging protest demonstrations against their upcoming relocation. It has been a week of slow death by strangulation for the people of Gazaùworkers unable to get to jobs and losing their pay, university students missing all their classes. Students in North Gaza who can reach their schools in Gaza City often find there is no class because their teachers are stuck on the wrong side of Abu Holi. The Israeli Army recognizes no exceptionsùeven patients needing emergency medical care cannot pass. All these clear violations of the Geneva Conventions are still met mainly by silence from the rest of the world.

23 April 05

Israeli Tank Passing through Abu Holi Checkpoint, thousands of people were waiting the Israeli soldiers to reopen the checkpoint which is the only road that connects North and South Gaza Strip

Under a broiling sun, thousands of people were waiting at Abu Holi checkpoint which separates the no rth and south areas of Gaza. Everyone in southern Gaza with business in Gaza City—that means all university students and everyone with jobs or family in the north, and all northern Gazans with work, friends, family in the south, or a need to travel abroad through the Rafah crossing, must enter the concrete and barbed wire corridors guarded by Israeli soldiers in sniper towers and pass the Abu Holi checkpoint. Indeed, some make—or try to make—the round trip daily.

Nothing moved for hour after hour. This morning, Abdelkader Abu Libdah, 48, was injured by Israeli soldiers. Exactly why they attacked him is unclear, but before the incident was over, a number of others waiting to cross were also injured by teargas inhalation. In addition to the normal traffic, a number of ambulances transporting patients to hospitals in Gaza City were stuck in the long lines, plus many busloads of school children. Finally, in the late afternoon, a loudspeaker made the dreaded announcement that the checkpoint would not open at all today, and drivers backed slowly away to ret urn to their points of origin.

Once again, the Israeli Army has tightened the noose of occupation around the economy and civil life of all Gaza. However difficult for the 1.3 million Palestinians here, it is not that surprising. The Jewish eight-day holiday of Passover begins at sundown Saturday, and Gaza is usually subject to checkpoint closures during Israeli holidays. To make matters worse, three Israeli soldiers were wounded by a roadside bomb near Karni crossing in north Gaza. Karni is the entryway for merchandise and industrial goods into Gaza, and the Israeli soldiers were patrolling the fenced Gaza/Israel border nearby when a roadside explosive device went off near their jeep, injuring three. No Palestinian militant group has claimed responsibility and the major militant factions have observed a ceasefire, despite the IOF's killing three Rafah teenagers earlier this month. The Israeli Army responded to the bombing at Karni by firing into a nearby Gaza City district. People throughout Gaza are braced for more retaliation and hardship. When the checkpoints are closed, and the borders sealed, it means slow death for people here.

16 April 05

Demonstrations all over the Gaza Strip at "Al Aqsa in Danger day", all the Gaza Strip and West Bank demonstrated

In a move designed to re-ignite the intifada and destroy the Gaza withdrawal plans, the extremist settlers declared their intention to attack the Al Aqsa Mosque in East Jerusalem on Sunday, April 10. The Haram al Sharif, the Noble Sanctuary, is actually a 35 acre compound including the Dome of the Rock, the Al Aqsa Mosque, courtyards, gardens, a museum, and many other artistic and religious treasures. All Palestinians feel an obligation to s afeguard these Islamic holy places not just for the world's Moslems but for all people of good will.

Tens of thousands of Gaza residents, as well as Palestinians in the West Bank and Jerusalem, organized peaceful demonstrations protesting the planned outrage. "We will sacrifice our blood and bodies for the sake of our Holy Land," said 41-year-old Abu Adham of Khan Younis. "We are standing alone in the face of injustice, but we will never, never allow those people to attack our holy places."

His feelings were echoed all over Occupied Palestine by thousands of students and citizens of all ages who attended the demonstrations. In Jerusalem, thousands of Palestinians stayed within the mosque after Friday prayers, while hundreds more, many of them older people who survived the attacks of 1948, got past the Israeli security cordon into the mosque on Saturday and stayed there overnight to defend the Noble Sanctuary from possible attack.. The Israeli police forbade the demonstration on Sunday, and arrested some of the extremist settler s who defied their orders to disperse.

10 April 05

Young men are identifying the bodies of the boys killed while playing football
at Rafah refugee Camp

Children's corpses in the hospital again, major shelling and the threat of death from the circling Apaches again—all the fear, all the horror--it is happening again and the people of Rafah are hiding in their houses.

The cease-fire, announced on March 17 by all the militant factions, was never absolutely respected by the Israeli army But the level of shelling, the pace of gunfire, did slow to the point where people felt some cautious hope. Here in Rafah, people living in areas near the Israeli settlements found themselves under sporadic fire—from both the Israeli Army and the settlers themselves—with some frequency.

But things have taken a huge jump back today toward the horrors we hoped were over when three teenagers were killed by Israeli Army gunfire near the border in Tal-Al-Sultan. A group of boys in their mid-teens were playing soccer in a playground in the Block J area about 150 feet from the border fence. Palestinian witnesses and medics say the ball was kicked out of bounds and some of the boys chased it into the border zone. Th e Israeli army snipers in the guard towers opened fire. Two boys were killed immediately. The ambulances were prevented from reaching the boys for some time and a third boy survived long enough to have surgery at Rafah's Al Najjar Hospital, but ultimately died of his wounds. They are Khaled Ghanaam, 14, Ashraf Mussa, 14, and Hassan Abu Zaid, 15. Other boys in the soccer game fled t o safety and explained what had happened to the Palestinian security forces.

Sources at the hospital said the boys had multiple gunshot wounds in the chest and neck. Initial reports from the Israeli Army called the boys "arms smugglers" and said they ignored warning shots. Palestinian witnesses said they were simply playing soccer and trying to retrieve a ball.

There are sketchy reports I can get by walki-talki that some of the militants have sworn revenge and are firing Qassams at the Israeli settlements, while higher-ranking militant leaders have said they will still try to preserve the cease-fire. President Abbas has said, "We cannot accept that our children are being killed."

People here have been worried and tense all week at reports that an extremist right-wing Israeli group is threatening to attack the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem tomorrow. Whatever is happening in Jerusalem, whatever the leaders are saying, the reality her e is terrible. Last night, a 30-year-old man was seriously injured by Israeli fire as he was on his way home in a border neighborhood. Last night, all of Rafah came under shelling, and the sky is full of Apaches as I write.

I just learned by phone from medical workers in Khan Younis that three children have been shot there in one of the areas near an Israeli settlement. The ambulances cannot reach them. I think it is too dangerous to try to get to Khan Younis and investigate in person. People here are distraught. I can hear shelling quite close to the internet café and should leave.

7 March 05

The last fuanrel in Rafah Refugee Camp of Mazen Ben Hassan,
the IOF shelling is still ongoing during the nights

Whether one calls it a truce, a cease-fire, or a "calm-down" period, the Israeli army shelling is still ongoing in the refugee camps in Gaza. This week many people were injured, and some few were killed..

A bomb exploded in the Tal Al Sultan neighborhood of Rafah, seriously injuring four children who happened to be nearby. Residents think the device was a landmine left by the Israeli soldiers during one of the many incursion the area has suffered in recent years. Ambulances converged on the western Rafah neighborhood to rush the injured to Abu Yousif Al Najjar Hospital. Dr. Ali Musa, the hospital director, said the children had serious injuries from flying shrapnel. They are Ibrahim Aal Najjar, 14; Ahmed Qofah, 14' Ameer Nawfal, 5; and Ahmed's 9-month-old baby brother, Khaled Qufah.

Mazen Ben Hassan, 19, was killed recently by the IOF shooting in unknown conditions. Another 13-year-old boy, Jehad Judah, was seriously injured by Israeli bullets. Judah suffered gunshot wounds while near his house.

While the major incursions have stopped in the last few days, and the pace of shooting is somewhat lessened, closures of the main roads are still in force. Salah-ah-Deen street, the main north-south road connecting the major towns and refugee camps through Gaza, is closed, and the al-Mawasi area near the beach, once a thriving fishing and farming area, remains blocked off from the rest of Gaza by the occupying forces. Of course, there has been virtually no relief yet from the widespread poverty and unemployment affecting the citizens here.

This week, 21 schoolchildren had to be hospitalized with severe stomach trouble. The doctors treating them suspect they were all exposed to a toxin or drank tainted water. Since virtually all the Palestinian areas of Gaza lack clean drinking water and rely on bottled water, the precise source of the problem is puzzling. Is there some new danger in the environment on top of all the ones we're already aware of?

Four Palestinians were injured at the Rafah Refugee Camp during random shelling in the middle of the Camp in Rafah.

Palestinian medical sources at Abu Yousif Al Najjar mentioned that 29 years old man Hamed Al Dbabed, Jamal Al Shawi 28 years old, and Ahmed Sakinah whom has been injured in his backbone during random gunfire..

On the other hand, a 25 years old Palestinians security sources get killed when a tunnel collapsed over his head, while he was inspecting one of the houses and found a tunnel, eyewitnesses said.

” The idea of the tunnels is not right, and the Palestinian Authority demolished some houses and claim that there are tunnels in order to satisfy Israel” said one of the eyewitnesses.

On the other hand, the families of the Palestinians prisoner s in Rafah appeals to the whole world and international community to crack down on Israel and find an urgent solution for the prisoners.

Rafah during the morning hours witnesses heavy shelling and shooting, despite of the Israeli announcement of ceasefire. The shelling goes as so long as there is fog in the night and morning hours, that thing which make the school students scared to go to their schools in every morning.

17 February 05

Palestinians getting killed everyday even under what is called “ peace talks". P alestinian medic worker getting the body of a Palestinian young man killed in recent random shooting

The continuous nightmare haunting Palestinian children everyday and night, as the number of students and children killed by the IOF increases

Despite all the optimistic media reports and the omnipresent photos of Sharon and Abbas shaking hands, the killing continues in Rafah.

The latest victim was Ibrahim Abu Jazar, killed by Israeli soldiers while he stood near a childrens' playground in Rafah. He was wearing earphones and listening to local news on a small portable radio when he was shot. One of the children who was there said, "While we were playing football [soccer], the soldiers started shooting at us, so we all ran away." Apparently, Abu Jazar didn't hear the shots fast enough.

A few days earlier, Alaa Abu Jazzar, a little girl three years old, sustained a serious head injury from Israeli army fire while she was playing in her neighborhood. Khaled Al Shaer, 26, was wounded in the right shoulder near the Salah Al Deen Israeli gate. Of course, there is an official cease-fire in place, and the international press claims things are "calm" in Gaza, but the word doesn't seem to have reached the Israeli soldiers on the Rafah/Egypt border and guarding the Israeli settlements. Shelling of the civilian neighborhoods of Rafah near the border is still a daily event.

Technically, the Rafah Crossing on the Gaza/Egypt border has been re-opened but the ban on travel for Palestinians under 35 is still absolute. Israel has been pressed to ease the restriction, especially for people seeking medical care overseas, but there is so far no indication of a change in Israeli policy.

Another water well destroyed

This morning, Israeli shelling from the Morag settlement destroyed a fresh-water well and the building around it. Throughout the intifada, Rafah's water wells and pumping stations have often been targeted, and municipal workers trying to repair them have been fired on as well.

A day of funerals

As an outgrowth of the Sharm al Sheik summit last week, yesterday Israel returned the bodies of 15 Palestinians killed during the last four years. It was never clear why those bodies had been withheld from their families for so long. As a result, there were funerals all through Gaza today.

2 February 05

When schoolgirls see and feel the death of their classmate, the classmate of Noran Deeb whom was killed inside the school

An old man lamenting over the body of one of the children who was killed

Palestinians soldiers spreaded at the border line are carrying the body of the 65 years old man whom wad killed by the Israeli bullets.

Noran Eyad Deeb, a girl of 10, was shot and killed today while in the schoolyard at Rafah Elementary "B" School, run by UNRWA. She and the other pupils were lining up for for afternoon assembly. All UNRWA schools are clearly marked and fly the United Nations flag.

Another schoolgirl, Aysha Al Khatib, was injured in the hand by a second bullet fired at the same time.

At the time of the incident, firing had been heard from the direction of the Israeli-controlled border area. The school’s teaching staff were tryi ng to get the children out of the schoolyard to safety when Noran was hit in the face.

This is the fifth time in the last two years that children have been killed or seriously injured inside UNRWA school premises in the Gaza Strip. Two girls were killed in separate incidents in Rafah and Khan Younis last year; fifth grade boys were shot in their Rafah classroom last year, and a little girl was permanently blinded in Khan Younis in March 2003.

Dr. Ali Musa, director of the Abu Youif Al Najjar hospital in Rafah confirmed that Noran Eyad Deeb "was shot in the face by Israeli snipers. Her classmate with a bullet wound in her hand is still hospitalized."

The Palestinian Authority officially condemned the ongoing targeting of children and once again asked Isarel to halt its aggression against civilians. "Killing this schoolgirl is a crime and a bad message to the world," said Prime Minster Ahmed Qorie. "W e hope that the international community will make Israel respond positively to the Palestinian initiatives and the concrete steps taken by the Palestinian Authority to ensure calm," he added.

Elderly man killed

While the Palestinian Authority's new president Mahmoud Abbas has deployed 3000 Palestinian police on the Egypt/Gaza borderline and near the Israeli settlements to prevent attacks by militants, the Israeli soldiers are still targeting civilian neighborhoods in all parts of Rafah. Eid Abu Jarabea, 65, was shot dead while he walked in the Al Brazil area of Rafah which is near the border.

The Israeli soldiers reported seeing the body of the elderly man to the Palestinians National Forces, but it took more than three hours for the ambulances and medics to locate Jarabea's body. They finally found him in the rubble of demolished houses. </ font>