A gunman killed three Israeli soldiers, including two women, in a joint attack on a Jewish settlement in the Gaza Strip this morning by the two main Palestinian Islamic militant groups.
The attack by Islamic Jihad and Hamas followed a meeting in Syria at which they pledged tighter co-operation in the three-year-old Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation.
The Israeli army said a militant armed with an assault rifle and grenades infiltrated the heavily guarded Netzarim settlement before dawn and opened fire before soldiers shot him dead.
It said two of the dead were women and two other soldiers were wounded, including a woman who was seriously hurt. Another militant also appeared to have taken part but did not enter the settlement and escaped.
"At the moment it is a night of very thick fog, and you can't see even one metre ahead. The terrorists exploit a night like this for very intense activity," Major General Dan Harel told reporters at the scene.
The attack was the latest blow to the stalled US-backed peace "road map" after Israel killed 12 Palestinians, including militants and civilians, in air raids on Monday and Palestinian gunmen killed three Israeli soldiers in an ambush on Sunday.
Islamic militant groups have vowed to avenge Monday's air raids, from which a 12th victim died of his wounds overnight, and a series of raids in southern Gaza which have left a trail of death and destruction.
About 7,000 Jewish settlers live in the densely populated Gaza Strip among more than a million Palestinians.
The international community regards the settlements in the West Bank and Gaza, territories which Israel occupied in a 1967 war, as illegal under international law. Israel disputes this. Yesterday, Israel published tenders for building 323 new homes in two settlements in the West Bank, the second time in a month it has defied the road map on this issue, prompting Palestinian calls for US intervention.