Israel Kills Top Hamas Leader in Missile Strike

Israel assassinated top Hamas leader Abdel-Aziz al-Rantissi in a missile strike on Saturday, dealing another major blow to the militant group before a planned U.S.-backed withdrawal from the Gaza Strip.

Tens of thousands of Palestinians surged onto Gaza’s streets, vowing to avenge the foremost figure in a group that has killed hundreds of Israelis in suicide bombings. Israel said it had killed a "mastermind of terrorism."

The helicopter attack was especially devastating for Hamas, which has sworn to destroy the Jewish state, as it occurred less than a month after Israel killed the group’s spiritual leader Ahmed Yassin in a similar raid.

Witnesses said two of Rantissi’s bodyguards were also killed in the attack in which two missiles were fired at a car.

Medics said Rantissi, 56, Hamas’s leader in the militant group’s Gaza Strip stronghold, had been rushed to hospital in critical condition after the attack. His skull was crushed and he was covered in wounds.

A crowd of Palestinians swarmed around the wreckage of the white car, pulling out what appeared to be fragments of clothing.

VOW OF REVENGE

"Israel will regret this. Revenge is coming," said senior Hamas leader Ismail Haniya, whose group has been behind scores of suicide attacks against Israel in a three-year-old Palestinian uprising.

"This blood will not be wasted. It is our fate in Hamas and it is our fate as Palestinians to die as martyrs," Haniya told reporters at the hospital.

Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Jonathan Peled said: "Israel...today struck a mastermind of terrorism, with blood on his hands.

"As long as the Palestinian Authority does not lift a finger and fight terrorism, Israel will continue to have to do so itself."

Rantissi, a co-founder of Hamas, had become one of its two main leaders since Israel’s killing of Yassin on March 22.

The air strike occurred hours after an Israeli border policeman was killed by a Palestinian suicide bomber at the main Erez crossing on the Israeli-Gaza border.

The killing of Rantissi occurred against the backdrop of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon winning U.S. backing for a unilateral Gaza pullout plan.

Palestinian anger has mounted over President Bush’s related decisions this week to allow the Jewish state to keep some parts of the West Bank and reject any right of return for Palestinian refugees to what is now Israel.

Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qurie said Rantissi’s assassination was a direct result of encouragement from the United States for Israel.

"The Palestinian cabinet considers this terrorist Israeli campaign is a direct result of American encouragement and the complete bias of the American administration toward the Israeli government," Qurie said.

But a State Department official denied Washington had given the green light and said the United States had not changed its policy of opposing Israeli assassinations.

"We think Israel should bear in mind the consequences of what it’s doing and we also think the Palestinians should get a handle on terrorism," said the official, declining to be named.

Israeli and U.S. officials have expressed fears Hamas could play a big role in the Gaza Strip once it is under Palestinian rule. Sharon is determined the planned pullout should not be seen as a victory for militants.

Israel tried to kill Rantissi, public face of a militant group that normally stays in the shadows, last June.

On that occasion he and his teenage son were wounded in an Israeli helicopter missile strike on his car, also in Gaza City.

Rantissi had refused to go into hiding like many of his comrades on Israel’s wanted list since Hamas launched a suicide bombing campaign to spearhead the Palestinian uprising.

He had long depicted himself as a Hamas politician with no links to the military wing.

But Israel refused to accept the distinction, accusing him of being a top decision-maker on attacks and of using his media role to incite violence.

With Rantissi filling the role of Hamas spokesman, camera crews from around the world had trooped to his modestly furnished living room to hear him issue vows of revenge, often in calm, even tones, for Israel’s killing of militants. (Reuters)