12 May 2004	Wednesday	21 Rabi-ul-Awwal 1425

GAZA CITY, May 11: Six Israeli soldiers were killed when their troop transport was blown up on Tuesday during an army raid into Gaza City that also left seven Palestinians dead and scores wounded.

The destruction of the armoured personnel carrier (APC) was one of the Israeli army's heaviest losses in a single Palestinian attack since the September 2000 outbreak of the intifada.

The huge blast, which according to an army spokesman was caused by several bombs that ripped through the vehicle, which itself was carrying explosives, killed all six crew members.

The devastating attack led to gruesome scenes of militants parading in the streets of the Zeitun area of Gaza City with what they said were remains of the dead soldiers.

"Six IDF (army) soldiers were killed this morning during an IDF operation to target Qassam (rocket) workshops in Gaza City, when an armoured personnel carrier was struck by an explosive device planted by Palestinian terrorists," the army said in a statement.

"The armoured personnel carrier was carrying explosives intended to be used to destroy workshops," it added. The Hamas announced earlier that fighters from its military wing - the Ezzedin al-Qassam Brigades - managed to stop the vehicle with an anti-tank missile.

Several bombs that had been planted on the spot were then detonated, destroying the APC, the group said, adding it had documented the attack with pictures to be released later.

Witnesses saw gun-toting masked men parading in the streets with body parts apparently taken from the wreck of the vehicle. They included part of a scalp and the remains of a leg.

"I took some metal parts of the tanks. The body parts were dispersed everywhere, on to the roofs of some houses and in the street," Mohammed Azam, 45, said. "We're happy. This is part of the revenge after they killed our leaders," he added, in reference to the assassinations of Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin and his successor Abdelaziz Rantissi in March and April respectively.

"We are very happy with the killing of the six soldiers. We hope there will be more. We hope Zeitun will become the graveyard of the Israeli soldiers," said another local resident, who asked to be named only as Mohammed. Israeli troops remained in the area in a bid to retrieve the bodies.

"We are currently conducting a search and rescue operation, but it is taking place in a very dangerous urban area," a senior military source said. "We attach great significance to the retrieval of the bodies, which we want to be buried in a dignified way."

Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades an armed offshoot of the mainstream Fatah, and the Al Quds Brigades, the radical movement Islamic Jihad's military wing, claimed they were holding on to some body parts. They would seek to use them as bargaining chips.

The ongoing clashes in the militant stronghold started shortly after midnight when Israeli units backed by helicopters entered the area to destroy workshops used to manufacture the makeshift Qassam rockets built by the Hamas movement.

Armed Palestinian groups have on rare occasions in the past managed to blow up Israeli tanks in the Gaza Strip, but Tuesday's ambush was the most deadly of its kind. Two of the six Palestinians killed in the Zeitun clashes, 30-year-old Omar al-Jajawi, who was hit in the chest by gunfire, and Saadi Nasar, 20, were members of Hamas, the movement said.

Israeli forces opened fire at a group of armed Palestinians "wounding or killing three of them; then a helicopter fired a rocket at a second group", an army spokesman said.

An Israeli helicopter later fired a missile at a car near a market in the Shajayah neighbourhood, killing a 12-year-old Palestinian boy and wounding five other civilians, medical sources said. -AFP