TWELVE people were killed as fighting escalated around the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip soon after Israel and the Palestinians launched talks on the core issues of their conflict.Israeli troops killed 11 Palestinians on Tuesday, including the son of a Hamas leader, as gun battles flared during a new army operation in Gaza City, while militants in the territory shot dead a civilian in Israel in a rare sniper attack.
The fighting erupted a day after a meeting of top Israeli and Palestinian negotiators, hot on the heels of US President George W. Bush's visit and his prediction of a peace treaty by the time he leaves office in a year.
"These massacres cannot bring peace," he said.
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The Israeli assaults on Gaza have sown further discord between Israel and the Palestinians, who are also angry over the expansion of Jewish settlements on occupied land despite the revived negotiations.
In Tuesday's violence, medics said Israeli troops killed 11 Palestinians during an operation in eastern Gaza City, with witnesses reporting heavy exchanges of gunfire. At least six of those killed were Hamas militants, including the son of a hardline leader of the Islamist movement, Mahmud Zahar, medics and the group said. The identities of the others were not immediately known.
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In southern Israel, an Ecuadorian man volunteering at a kibbutz collective farm was shot dead by bullets fired from Gaza in an attack claimed by Hamas.