Special report: Palestine-Israel Relations

    GAZA, May 4 (Xinhua) -- Three Hamas militants and a Palestinian civilian were wounded early Sunday during an Israeli incursion in southeast Gaza Strip, witnesses and security sources said.

    Witnesses said the Hamas fighters were wounded when an Israeli aircraft fired a rocket at a gathering of militants in Khouza'a town, east of southern Gaza city Khan Younis. One of the gunmen was seriously hurt, according to Hamas security sources. Earlier, an Israeli sniper shot at a 20-year-old Palestinian Mohammed al-Najjar in his house, critically hitting his head, a spokesman for Nasser hospital in Khan Younis said.

    A number of Israeli tanks and bulldozers rolled into the area two hours after midnight and snipers positioned on high rooftops after occupying at least four houses, the residents said. Protected by tank machine-gun fire, the bulldozers leveled and uprooted tens of olive trees and other crops. Palestinian fighters exchange fire with the soldier and fire at the vehicles using mortar and RPG shells.

    The incursion comes as Palestinian factions accepted an Egypt-brokered ceasefire with Israel.

    Israel has not yet responded to the proposal which aims at reducing the offensive and ending the siege on the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip.