Two Israeli helicopters attacked the Palestinian Authority's command headquarters next to Rafah in the Gaza Strip early Sunday, said reports.
There were no immediate reports of injuries.
An Israeli army spokesman claimed that the attack was in response to “Palestinian mortar fire on an Israeli army base Saturday night,” according to Haaretz newspaper.
A Palestinian security official told Israel Radio that three missiles hit the structure and that he and other Palestinians in the building had fled.
Meanwhile, AFP said that clashes broke out late Saturday following an Israeli missile attack on a convoy carrying a top official of the Fateh movement.
Israeli reports and AFP said that Palestinian gunmen opened fire on Israeli forces in the east occupied Jerusalem settlement of Gilo from the Palestinian neighborhood of Beit Jala.
An Israeli army spokesman claimed that “it prompted return fire from the Israeli army around the Bethlehem sector in the West Bank.”
A female Jewish settler was slightly wounded during the firefight, the army said, while Palestinian security officials said five Palestinians were injured.
Earlier, Israeli forces had fired missiles at a three-car convoy of Marwan Barghouthi, Fateh secretary general in the West Bank, as he was leaving his offices in Ramallah.
But Israeli security officials appeared confused as to the real identity of the target.
One security source said it was a 22-year-old member of Fateh's elite Force 17, Majend Said Monir Diria.
Others quoted by army radio said it was Mohannad Abu Halawa, who was in the lead car when the missiles were fired.
He escaped with burns after the first missile missed the vehicle, and fled before a second blew it up.
Members of Barghouthi's retinue told AFP the car destroyed was frequently used by Barghouti himself.
Fateh stressed in a statement, cited by AFP, that Barghouthi had been the real target. Two passersby were also slightly hurt in the blast.
Late Saturday, Palestinian President Yasser Arafat appealed to the United States, the European Union, Russia and the United Nations to urgently intervene to stop "Israeli aggression."
Arafat "sent urgent messages to the presidents of the United States and Russia, the leadership of the European Union and to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan," his advisor Nabil Abu Rudeina told AFP.
Rudeina said Arafat had urged them "to intervene immediately to stop the dangerous escalation of violence in the Palestinian territories, which could drag the whole region into a serious crisis."
"He also asked them to send international observers to oversee the implementation of the Mitchell report," said Rudeina.
Fateh also called on Palestinians across the region to fill the streets in protest against Israel.
The attack came only four days after an Israeli helicopter attacked the offices of the Hamas movement in the West Bank town of Nablus, killing five members of the Islamist resistance, including two senior officials, as well as two young boys and a journalist.
Israel came in for sharp international criticism for the Nablus attack, but said it would stick to its policy of targeting Palestinian militants it believes are planning bomb attacks.
There was also internal criticism Saturday, as the Peace Now movement staged a large demonstration against the military escalation by the Israeli government, involving several thousand people, said Haaretz.
It started with a candle-lit procession from the Tel Aviv square where former Israeli Labor prime minister Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated in November 1995 by a Jewish extremist over his peace policies towards the Palestinians.
"We can today no longer continue the policy of hiding our heads in the sand. Contrary to right-wing propaganda, there is an alternative to war: a ceasefire supervised by international observers and a return to the negotiating table," said Moria Shlomot, an official from the Peace Now movement.
Since the September 2000 eruption of the latest Palestinian uprising against 34 years of Israeli military occupation, AFP estimates that Palestinians have killed 128 Israelis with weapons ranging from stones and knives to machineguns and car bombs. Israeli military sources have reported well over 600 injuries to Israelis of Jewish descent.
In the same time period, according to AFP, Israeli soldiers and armed Jewish settlers have killed 13 Arab Israelis and 540 Palestinians with weapons ranging from machineguns and tanks to US-made Apache helicopter gunships and F-16s.
According to an Amnesty International report issued early this year, nearly 100 of the Palestinians killed were children. In addition, the Palestinian Red Crescent Society has reported over 14,000 Palestinians wounded.
Jewish author Noam Chomsky, who according to a New York Times Book Review article is “arguably the most important intellectual alive,” has been quoted as saying: “State terrorism is an extreme form of terrorism, generally much worse than individual terrorism because it has the resources of a state behind it.” – Albawaba.com
© 2001 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
