The Israeli army made a new incursion into Palestinian Authority-controlled Rafah on Tuesday, destroying four homes, said reports.
A Palestinian public security spokesman was quoted by Haaretz newspaper as saying that the army incursion into Rafah was accompanied by tank shelling and heavy gunfire, which caused severe damage to several houses in the area.
Eyewitnesses told the paper that mosque loudspeakers were heard in the town calling on residents to defend Rafah, the Tel Aviv-based daily said.
They said that the occupation army shelled and destroyed the major electricity transmitter that supplies the whole town with electricity, adding that the whole area was plunged into darkness.
Over 700 Palestinians and more than 180 Israelis have been killed in the latest Palestinian uprising against 34 years of Israeli military occupation, according to news agencies.
Meanwhile, two Israeli soldiers were lightly wounded when Palestinians fired mortar shells at the Jewish settlement of Kfar Darom in the Gaza Strip overnight, reports said.
In addition, the Israeli army succeeded in detonating a bomb was discovered during a routine patrol.
According to Israeli Army Radio, the army opened fire and successfully detonated the device with no casualties.
The incursion came less than a day after the US Secretary of State Colin Powell called on Israel to end its 34-year occupation of Palestinian land.
Powell's speech came as Israeli army leaders said that the overcrowded Gaza Strip, where Israel's settlements have time and again been the flashpoints of fighting, could witness a huge popular uprising sparked by economic stress and desperation that would oust the Palestinian Authority – Albawaba.com
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