4 dead, dozens injured in Gaza blast near house leveled in summer war
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Version 0 of 1. RAFAH, Gaza — Four people were killed and at least 43 injured Thursday after an explosion near the ruins of a house that was destroyed last summer in an Israeli airstrike, according to Gaza health officials. Initial reports suggested that the blast was caused by unexploded ordnance left behind by Israel after the 50-day war it fought with the militant group Hamas in Gaza last year. But neither Hamas, which rules the coastal enclave, nor Israel would confirm the cause of the explosion. [Israel launches ground offensive in Gaza] Ashraf al-Qidra, a spokesman for Gaza’s Health Ministry, said the men who were killed had been clearing rubble from the destroyed house in the al-Shabura refugee camp in Rafah, southern Gaza. They were all members of the same family. Eyad Al-Bozom, a spokesman for the Hamas-run Interior Ministry, said the ministry was investigating the cause of the explosion. The block where the house sat belongs to a family known to have close ties to Hamas and its military wing, the Izzedine al-Qassam Brigades. One of those killed was Abdul Rahman Abu Nuqira, a member of the military wing; among the injured was his father, Ayman Abu Nuqira, who worked in the office of exiled Hamas chief Khaled Meshal when Meshal was based in Damascus, Syria, before moving to Qatar. A statement published on Hamas’s official Web site said the younger Abu Nuqira was killed in an “accidental explosion.” Following the blast, masked and armed men from the Izzedine al-Qassam Brigades blocked access to the area, fueling suspicion that the ruins or a nearby property may have been used to store explosives or rockets. Israel maintains that Gaza militants routinely store weapons in and under civilian homes in an attempt to shield them from Israeli bombardments. Rafah, which sits on the border between Gaza and Egypt, is the base for an extensive underground smuggling industry and is a center of militant activity — not just by Hamas, which is considered a terrorist organization by Israel and the United States, but also by other organizations, including extremist Salafist groups. [What is life like inside the tunnels of Gaza?] However, according to the United Nations, Israel left behind more than 7,000 pieces of unexploded ordnance in the Gaza Strip at the end of last summer’s war. Only about a third of them have been cleared. Last year, six people, including a video journalist from the Associated Press and his Palestinian translator, were killed as Gaza police engineers tried to defuse one of the unexploded bombs. At the scene of Thursday’s explosion, witnesses could not confirm the cause of the explosion, giving conflicting testimony. “The neighbors said there was an old woman trapped inside,” said Tayseer Siam, 36, who said he was returning from a nearby market when he saw a fire in the house. “I tried to rescue her, but within a few minutes there was a big explosion, which threw me about a meter. I lost consciousness and found myself in hospital.” According to Rabea Abu Nuqira, 35, who was preparing a mourners’ tent nearby, “Workers were removing rubble from the destroyed house and put clothes and remains of furniture on a fire, and suddenly the unexploded rocket went off.” At a ceremony Wednesday marking the end of a military-style summer camp for 25,000 Palestinian youths, Hamas warned of renewed violence unless Israel lifts its nine-year-old blockade of Gaza. “Today, our message to the occupier is very clear: We will not accept a blockade,”said Mahmoud Zahar, a senior Hamas leader. Ruth Eglash in Jerusalem contributed to this report. The military operation in Gaza that still haunts Israel one year later A year after the Gaza war, good times are back on Tel Aviv’s beaches Does Israel actually occupy the Gaza Strip? |