The Israeli army admitted a "possibility" Saturday that an Israeli bomb planted for Palestinian activists killed five Palestinian children two days before in the southern Gaza Strip city of Khan Younis, the army said in a press statement.
"Head of the Southern Command General Doron Almog, investigating the incident, allowed for the possibility that the children were killed from a bomb planted by the Israeli army at a location used by terrorists to fire against our forces," the statement said, quoted by AFP.
The schoolboys were killed by what is thought to have been an Israeli booby-trap as they walked across a field, the frequent site of gun battles between the army and Palestinian gunmen.
The Tel Aviv-base Haaretz newspaper quoted the army as expressing sorrow over the deaths.
Preliminary reports suggested that the children were most likely killed as a result of playing with an explosive device set by the army in the area. The statement went on to say that the device had been placed in that location because it had been used many times by Palestinian gunmen to shoot on a nearby army outpost.
Israeli Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer announced Friday that Israel would launch an investigation into the deaths of the five children.
On Saturday evening, meanwhile, Israeli tanks made an incursion into the northern Gaza Strip town of Beit Lahia and shelled a school, Palestinian security sources and witnesses told AFP.
The tanks rolled 800 meters (yards) into the self-rule Palestinian town and fired at least three shells at a school, they said, adding that there had so far been no reports of injuries.
And Haaretz reported that there has been a drive-by shooting attack on Israeli car close to entrance to Bat Hefer, on Green Line border. No injuries were reported – Albawaba.com
