Hamas planning protest against Gaza blockade, Israel sends reinforcements

Israeli forces along the border with Gaza were braced Monday to keep a Hamas demonstration against Israel's blockade of Gaza from turning into a mass breakout like last month's storming of the Gaza-Egypt border.

Hamas planned to send thousands of civilians in the direction of the Erez crossing between Israel and Gaza on Monday, protesting chronic shortages of vital supplies in Gaza because of the Israeli restrictions.

Israeli defense officials said they were taking steps to keep Palestinians from flooding into Israel, though they discounted rumors that Hamas would encourage the demonstrators to try to break down the border crossing.

Last month Hamas militants knocked down the wall between Gaza and Egypt with explosives, and hundreds of thousands of Palestinians raced across the border, flooding Egyptian towns and buying everything in sight.

It was a taste of freedom after months of shortages because of the Israeli blockade, imposed after the militant Islamic Hamas overran Gaza last June, expelling Fatah forces loyal to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. The blockade was tightened last month after an upsurge in daily rockets attacks on Israel from Gaza.

Egypt reclosed the border after about two weeks.

Morning radio newscasts said the army had moved an artillery battery up to the Israel-Gaza border and that thousands of police with non-lethal crowd control devices would back up soldiers during demonstrations on the other side. The army would not comment on its preparations, but Israeli leaders said they would not allow Palestinians to enter their country.

"Israel will protect its territory and prevent any breach of its sovereign borders," the Defense Ministry said, adding that if trouble were to erupt, "the sole responsibility rests on the shoulders of Hamas."

Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilnai said that as the general responsible for Gaza during a previous Palestinian uprising, he had seen mass demonstrations before and was confident the army would be able to cope.

"Once you are deployed and prepared and there is no element of surprise I imagine the outcome is very clear," he told Israel Radio. "Everything that it is necessary to do will be done."

Early Monday, an Israeli airstrike in southern Gaza killed two Hamas militants and wounded three, according to Hamas and Palestinian medical officials. The Israeli military said an aircraft targeted a group of gunmen spotted in the area. Hours later, a second airstrike killed a third Hamas gunman and wounded two others, Hamas said. The military confirmed the attack.

A third Palestinian militant was found dead on Monday morning in the southern Gaza border town of Rafah. A small Palestinian militant group, the Popular Resistance Committees, said the man belonged to their group and was killed while firing his weapon at nearby Israeli soldiers.