New Gaza incursion leaves 19 dead

Hundreds of Palestinians were detained

Nineteen Palestinians have been killed when Israeli troops using up to 30 tanks entered a refugee camp on Monday evening.

Israel has allowed Arafat to leave Ramallah after weeks of confinement

The deaths - in the Jabalya camp - came after six Palestinians died earlier in the day in clashes in Ramallah and the northern Gaza Strip.

Israeli troops detained more than 1,000 Palestinians during the raids.

Earlier, Israel announced that it was lifting its travel ban on Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, in return for his arrest of all the suspected assassins of Israeli Tourism Minister Rehavam Zeevi.

Refugee camp raid

One eyewitness in Jabalya reported very heavy fighting between Israeli troops and gunmen in the streets of the camp.

What is needed from the Israeli Government is to stop immediately its crimes and massacres against the Palestinian people

Palestinian Information Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo

He told the BBC's Gaza correspondent Kylie Morris that he was too frightened to open his windows to investigate any further.

Some residents fled the northern communities and made their way into nearby Gaza City itself.

Our correspondent says Jabalya is a stronghold for Palestinian national and Islamic groups.

On Monday it was the site of a march organised by the Islamic militant group Hamas to mark the Palestinian suicide attacks in Netanya and Jerusalem.

The advance follows similar operations by Israel in refugee camps in Qalqilya, Bethlehem and Tulkarm.

'Targeted mission'

Israeli military sources said the Jabalya operation, which lasted three hours, was a targeted mission to locate factories which make rockets and mortar shells.

The sources indicated soldiers were under orders to fire only at people who were armed and posed a threat.

In addition to the incursion into Jabalya, Israel fired rockets from Apache helicopters into a facility belonging to Mr Arafat's personal guard, Force-17, in Gaza's south.

And after midnight, Israeli gunboats fired on a Palestinian naval headquarters near Dir al-Balah in central Gaza.

Palestinian security sources said one person was killed and several others wounded in the attack.

Arafat 'freed'

Mr Arafat remained in his compound all day on Monday. Officials did not say when he would leave Ramallah.

When he begins to move around Palestinian territories, correspondents said he will see for himself the recent devastation inflicted by Israeli air strikes which have reduced his offices in Gaza, and in Nablus and Jenin in the West Bank, to rubble.

Israel says Mr Arafat will "need permission" before travelling abroad; Palestinian officials hope he will attend an Arab summit in Beirut later this month, where an emerging Arab peace initiative is expected to be presented.

Reactions

Tens of thousands of right-wing Israelis gathered in Tel Aviv on Monday night to urge their government to step up the military campaign.

Israeli society is split over Mr Sharon's approach

The demonstration follows a threat by four right-wing cabinet ministers to leave Mr Sharon's coalition because of what they see as his new softer line on the Palestinians.

Palestinian Information Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo said the Israeli decision to allow Mr Arafat to move had little significance:

"What is needed from the Israeli Government is to stop immediately its crimes and massacres against the Palestinian people and to end the closure that all the Palestinian people have been living under for more than 18 months," he said.

'Nazi behaviour'

About 400 Palestinians were rounded up in the West Bank town of Qalqilya on Monday, and close to 600 were detained in a refugee camp at Deheishe, near Bethlehem, in a search for militants.

Men aged between 15 and 45 in Deheishe were forced to stand - stripped to the waist and holding their hands to their heads - in a yard on the outskirts of the camp before they were taken away in plastic handcuffs.

Yasser Arafat accused Israeli soldiers of behaving like Nazis in the round-ups.

In an interview broadcast on Abu Dhabi television, he said Israeli soldiers had written numbers on the arms of Palestinians they arrested in a similar operation in Tulkarm last week.

"Is this not one of the methods used by the Nazis against the Jews," Mr Arafat asked. "Is this not a new Nazi racism? Is this acceptable to the international community?"