Sharon Invade Beit Hanoun, Kill 3 Palestinians

  Zionist  Occupation Forces (ZOF) killed 3 Palestinians and 23 wounded, among them 5 children and 4 critically,  others after raiding the northern Gaza Strip town of Beit Hanoun Thursday 27 morning in the first raid by the Zionist Occupation Forces in Gaza in ten days and the first since the US-led war on Iraq began over a week ago.

 Palestinian security sources said Zionist Occupation Forces armored vehicles backed by Apache helicopter gunships raided the town around 03:00 am and opened heavy chine gunfire at residents' houses and property. Among the victims were two Palestinian policemen killed when Zionist Apache gunships launched several missiles at their outpost at the entrance of the town. Palestinian medical sources identified the men as Iyad Fayad, 30, and Ihab Jarras, 21, adding that another 23 Palestinians were injured, two of them seriously.

Medical sources also accused Zionist Occupation Forces of preventing Palestinian ambulances from evacuating the wounded and that two of the victims were left bleeding to death.  "Zionist Occupation Forces did not allow the rescue teams to reach the wounded and thus prevented us from saving their lives, especially those who were in urgent need of medical treatment," said Dr. Mu'awiya Hassanein, the ER director at al-Shifa hospital in Gaza.  Ahmed Ismail, 28, a Palestinian rescue worker, also said that Israeli Occupation Forces troops kept medical teams out.  "Our cars came under fire three times when we tried to evacuate injured and dead people from the site," he said.

On Monday 24, the Palestinian Health Ministry said 241 Palestinians were killed since the beginning of the year 2003 in Zionist occupation army raids in the Occupied Palestinian territory.  Many of them were civilians, and more than half of them were in Gaza, the Ministry said.

Meanwhile in Gaza,  Zionist Occupation Forces  raided Barazil Refugee Camp in the southern Gaza Strip town of Rafah and demolished a house. Witnesses said Zionist Occupation Forces  bulldozers demolished the house of citizen Jamal Hasan, leaving his family without shelter.

Earlier in the same area, Zionist Occupation Forces bulldozers demolished Al-Nour Mosque, Palestinian security sources confirmed. Meanwhile, Zionist Occupation Forces solders raided the northern neighborhoods in Rafah town and detained a number of citizens, witnesses said. Palestinian officials identified some of the detainees as Saleem Aby Yousef, Hasan Suleiman, Subhi al-Malahi, and Faraj and Sa'ed 'Oweidah.

In the West Bank, Zionist Occupation Forces  detained 13 Palestinians late Wednesday night in Jenin, Zionist security sources said. In the village of Bani Naim, close to Hebron, Zionist Occupation Forces sealed the offices of a local charity, days after it has closed another in Hebron city