Gaza ground offensive underway
2009-01-04 07:13
Gaza City - Thousands of Israeli troops backed by columns of tanks and helicopter gun ships launched a ground offensive in Gaza on Saturday night.
Officials say they expect a lengthy fight in the densely populated territory after eight days of punishing air strikes failed to halt militant rocket attacks on Israel.
The incursion set off fierce clashes with Palestinian militants and Gaza's Hamas rulers vowed the coastal strip would be a "graveyard" for Israelis forces.
Army ambulances ferried wounded soldiers to a hospital in the southern Israeli city of Beersheba.
"This will not be easy and it will not be short," Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak said on national television about two hours after ground troops moved in.
Explosions
The night sky over Gaza was lit by the flash of bullets and balls of fire from tank shells.
Sounds of explosions were heard across Gaza City, the territory's biggest city, and high-rise buildings shook from the bigger booms.
TV images showed troops with camouflage face paint marching in single file.
As the ground troops moved in, Israel kept pounding Gaza with air strikes.
F-16 warplanes hit three targets within a few minutes, including a main Hamas security compound.
Gaza residents said that before dawn on Sunday troops were seen in the town of Beit Lahiya, north of Gaza City, and the sound of intense fighting could be heard just east of the city, toward the border with Israel.
In the city itself, the Hamas-run Al Aqsa radio station was in flames from a missile strike.
Staff had evacuated the building about a week earlier, at the start of the Israeli offensive, and continued broadcasting from another location.
Open fields fighting
Israeli security officials said initial clashes with militants took place in open fields and soldiers did not immediately move into Gaza's crowded cities, where warfare would likely get much deadlier.
"We have many, many targets," Israeli army spokesperson Avital Leibovich told CNN.
"To my estimation, it will be a lengthy operation."
Israeli leaders said the operation, known as Cast Lead, was meant to quell militant rocket and mortar fire on southern Israel.
They said it would not end quickly, but that the objective was not to reoccupy Gaza or topple Hamas.
The depth and intensity will depend in part on parallel diplomatic efforts that so far haven't yielded a truce proposal acceptable to Israel, the officials said.
Reservists
Israel called up tens of thousands of reservists in the event Palestinian militants in the West Bank or Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon decide to exploit the broad offensive in Gaza to launch attacks against Israel on other fronts.
The military said the country's north was on high alert in case Hezbollah decided to use its vast stockpiles of missiles against Israel.
Israel and Hezbollah fought a 34-day war in the summer of 2006.
- AP