Four Palestinians killed, PA deplores escalation
Medical sources said that a second Palestinian was killed by the bullets of the Israeli forces in al-Salam quarters in Rafah camp to the south of Gaza and thereby the number of killed Palestinians increased to 7 in Gaza during the 24 past hours.
Awead Ataya ( 19 year old) was killed after he was hit by bullets in the head fired by the Israeli soldiers near the border line with Egypt in al-Salam quarter in Rafah camp on Friday evening.
The occupation forces said its soldiers opened fire at three Palestinians while approaching one of its positions and injured them.
Earlier in the day, on Friday, one Palestinian was killed in Rafah by the fire of the occupation forces which alleged it opened fire at two veiled persons after monitoring them in the sector.
Prior to that, two Palestinians of Ezz Eddine al-Qassam group were killed in a bombardment by Israeli helicopters against Rafah, thereby the number of killed Palestinians increased to four, two of them were in Khan Younis which has been exposed since Wednesday to a military incursion that resulted in killing 11 Palestinians under the pretext of stopping missile and mortars shelling on Israeli settlements and towns.
Palestinian resistance fighters from Hamas fired two missiles of al-Qassam type from Gaza against the adjoining Israeli settlements on Friday afternoon. No news were reported on casualties.
One Israeli military source said that the two missiles were fired from Beit Hanoun in the north of Gaza and fell respectively near Sderout city and a nearby Cepotz in the Negev desert.
France expressed its concern over the continued Israeli incursion to the south of Gaza and called on all sides to "maintain self control in order to permit carrying out the Palestinian Presidential elections." In what had seemed a message of American assurances to the Palestinian leadership, the US secretary of state Colin Powell extended a message to the Palestinian prime minister Ahmad Qurei in which he stressed his country's determination to cooperate with the new Palestinian leadership and to work with it for reviving the efforts aiming to establish permanent peace with Israel.