Israeli army captures four Hamas gunmen in Gaza
GAZA (Reuters) - Israeli soldiers captured four Hamas militants after a gunfight in the Gaza Strip on Saturday, the Israeli army and Hamas's armed wing said.
"The four gunmen were taken into Israel for questioning," an army spokeswoman said.
Israel has killed at least 35 Palestinians in Gaza this week as part of what officials describe as a stepped-up campaign to curb rocket fire into the Jewish state.
Gaza militants have fired about 230 mortars and rockets at Israel in the past five days, the army said.
Hamas's armed wing confirmed Saturday's arrests and said the four gunmen were besieged in a house near the northern Gaza town of Jabalya.
"They fought until the last bullet," a Hamas spokesman said.
Hamas said the Israeli soldiers also arrested family members who had been in the house.
The Israeli army said in a statement the four militants, armed with assault rifles and grenades, opened fire at the soldiers. The gunmen were taken for questioning in Israel along with several other suspects, the statement said.
In an earlier attack in the northern Gaza Strip, an air strike killed two Hamas militants, the Islamist group said.
Hamas Islamists, who do not recognize Israel's right to exist, took over the Gaza Strip after routing Fatah forces loyal to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in June.
Abbas dismissed the Hamas-led government and appointed Western-backed Salam Fayyad as prime minister of an administration in the West Bank, where Fatah holds sway.
Fayyad, quoted in the official WAFA news agency, said on Saturday: "The firing of rockets from Gaza has brought our people atrocity and disaster."
Fayyad's government has described Israel's action in Gaza as a massacre and "a slap in the face" of renewed, U.S.-backed peace efforts.
The spokesman for Hamas's armed wing, Abu Ubaida, said the miilitant group would respond to Fayyad's condemnation of rocket fire by "escalating resistance" against Israel.
"As Palestinian resistance factions living under fire and siege, we are the ones who decide how to deal with the occupation," Abu Ubaida said.
(Additional reporting by Ari Rabinovitch and Haitham Tamimi, Writing by Ari Rabinovitch; Editing by Keith Weir)
