Day is bloodiest since Israel invaded Gaza

BEIT LAHIYA, Gaza Strip — Ali Ajrami and his nine children cowered in one room of their farm house in the northern Gaza Strip, trapped as fighting between Israeli troops and Palestinian militants flared into heavy combat.

Israeli tanks parked in a garden behind the tailor's house Thursday, and special forces soldiers took positions on the rooftops of neighboring buildings. Gunfire could be heard as Palestinian militants armed with AK-47s and rocket-propelled grenades fired at Israel's troops.

"We are trapped. I don't know what to do," Ajrami said.

He said he was struggling to keep his children indoors on what blew up into the bloodiest day of fighting since Israel invaded Gaza over a soldier's capture. At least 21 Palestinians and one Israeli soldier died.

Israeli troops retook three empty Jewish settlements nearly a year after abandoning them, seeking to carve out a temporary buffer zone in the northern Gaza Strip to prevent militants from firing more rockets into Israel.

Throughout the day, Israeli aircraft fired missiles at militants while Israeli tanks took up positions among tightly packed Palestinian homes. Apache helicopters hovered overhead, firing flares and machine guns to support ground troops fighting masked Palestinian gunmen.

After touring Gaza main hospital, Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh of the Islamic militant group Hamas called for international intervention to stop the Israeli offensive, which he called a "crime against humanity." Haniyeh said the Israeli push was "a desperate effort to undermine the Palestinian government under the pretext of a search for the missing soldier."

Earlier this week, Hamas militants fired two rockets into the southern Israeli city of Ashkelon. No one was hurt, but the rockets were the first to reach a major Israeli population center, indicating militants have obtained longer-range weapons.

In response, Israeli troops moved into the densely populated towns of Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza, where militants often launch rockets. The army said all attacks were aimed at militants.

"We are doing the utmost effort ... to avoid civilian casualties," said another military official, Brig. Gen. Ido Nehushtan. "Really, there is no other way of operating against terrorists who are operating inside their own civilian populations."

Israel began its ground invasion June 28, three days after militants linked to Hamas captured Israeli Cpl. Gilad Shalit, 19, in a daring cross-border raid. Israeli officials said they would do what was necessary to get the soldier back.

On Thursday, the fighting swelled — and so did the death toll.