| Submit your comments on this article |
| Israel-Palestine-Jordan |
| Hamas says its gunmen wound Israeli minister's aide |
| 2008-04-05 |
| Hamas said its gunmen wounded an aide to Israeli Interior Security Minister Avi Dichter on Friday when they opened fire from the Gaza Strip on an Israeli kibbutz that the minister was visiting. Mati Gil was shot and lightly wounded in the hip at the Nir-Am kibbutz and taken to hospital, Israeli rescue service Magen David Adom said. A Hamas official said the Islamist movement carried out the attack together with a hitherto unknown group. "Our fighters targeted the Israeli minister Avi Dichter in a joint operation with the Protectors of Al-Aqsa," said Abu Obeidah, spokesman of Hamas's military wing. "We severely injured his assistant." The minister was accompanying a group of US and Canadian Jews on a trip to show solidarity with residents of southern Israel, who are regularly targeted by rockets fired by militants in Gaza. A witness told Israeli public radio "shots suddently rang out and hit Mati," as Dichter was briefing the visitors on the security situation. "Israeli soldiers then entered the Gaza Strip," Moshe Ronnen added, a claim confirmed by security sources. For nearly a month, Israel and armed groups in Gaza appear to be observing a tacit truce. That has led to a drastic drop in the number of rockets fired and of Israeli attacks against the Palestinian enclave run by Hamas. |
| Posted by:Fred |