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GAZA CITY, Nov 22: Five Palestinian schoolchildren were killed on Thursday when one kicked an unexploded Israeli tank shell, shattering a relative calm that had settled over the Palestinian territories amid fresh US-led peace efforts.
The shell was on scrub land between a Jewish settlement and the Palestinian town of Khan Yunis, in the central Gaza Strip, when the children found it, said Palestinian security officer, Colonel Khaled Abu al-Ula.
Hospital officials said four of the children had been blown to pieces.
Despite their mutilated condition, the victims were identified as Mohammed al-Astal, 14, his six-year-old brother Akrem, and their cousins Omer al-Astal, 14 and his brother Annis, 10.
Another cousin, Mohammed al-Astal, aged 12, was also killed, while two other members of the large al-Astal clan were also injured.
Their deaths brought to 982 the number of people killed since the start of the intifada, most of them Palestinians.
Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat said the Palestinian Authority had sent an urgent message “to the United States, Europe and all the countries in the world about this crime.
“We told them Israel is responsible for the shelling and shooting and destruction, and leaving behind unexploded shells.”
Palestinian security officials had earlier accused the Israelis of firing tank shells in the area and killing three children, a charge the army denied.
The army said it was investigating the circumstances surrounding the deaths.
The blast shattered a relative calm of the last few days as Israelis and Palestinians await the arrival of two senior US officials trying to bring about a ceasefire.
US Secretary of State Colin Powell made a key speech on Monday on Washington’s vision for a way out of the 14-month conflict, in which he told both sides to end the violence, although he put the emphasis on Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat to clamp down on extremists.
He also told Israel to end its occupation of Palestinian territory. Israel has since carried out a number of raids into Palestinian-controlled land, arresting a slew of people it accused of being linked to attacks of militant groups.
In other incidents on Wednesday night, Israeli soldiers captured six Palestinian students during an overnight raid into Palestinian-ruled territory near the West Bank city of Ramallah, Palestinian officials said.
Using a tank and armoured vehicles, the soldiers moved into the university town of Bir Zeit and seized the students, who were members of the Hamas and Islamic Jihad.
‘TREACHEROUS SPEECH: US Secretary of State Colin Powell’s speech outlining Washington’s vision for a peaceful Middle East was treacherous, ill-defined and without substance, a leading Iraqi newspaper said on Thursday.
“Powell’s treacherous speech is without substance. It will quickly disappear and commits the United States to nothing,” said Babel, headed by Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s eldest son, Uday.
Powell delivered on Monday what was billed as the most important policy address of the Bush administration on Washington’s plan to help end Palestinian-Israeli clashes.
He said Israel should withdraw its troops from the West Bank and Gaza Strip, but also demanded that Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat strive harder to end attacks on Israel.
“Powell has not presented a defined plan and the United State knows very well the impossibility of a Palestinian state being created while Zionist occupation and expansion of settlements continue.
“With its new plan, the United States calls on the Palestinians to accept the policy of Zionist bulldozers and abandon the struggle so the (Israeli) crime becomes a fait accompli,” Babel said.
“The term ‘a fair and comprehensive peace’ is used by the United States each time it wants to pass policy hostile to the Arab world and has become a phrase without real contents for all US administrations.”
Washington “does not want a Palestinian state but small islands, disarmed and lacking sovereignty,” the paper concluded.—AFP
