Israeli tanks shelled a Hamas training camp in the central Gaza Strip early on Tuesday, killing at least 13 militants and wounding 30 people, witnesses and hospital sources said.

Tanks stationed at a border crossing between Israel and Gaza fired into the outskirts of the town of Shijaia, a stronghold of Hamas, the militant group behind a double suicide bombing that killed 16 people on buses in southern Israel last week.

Witnesses said explosions tore through a Hamas training ground after an exchange of fire with Palestinian gunmen in the area.

Hospital sources said all of the dead were Hamas members but that the wounded included civilians.

The Israeli army had no immediate comment. Israeli leaders had vowed to strike back hard in retaliation for last Tuesday's twin bombings in Beersheba, the first suicide attacks in the Jewish state in nearly six months.

In what appeared to be Israel's toughest response so far, a series of explosions could be heard just after midnight (17:00 EDT) in nearby Gaza City as Israeli helicopter gun ships roared overhead.

Hamas, sworn to Israel's destruction, is the main militant group spearheading a campaign of suicide bombings against Israelis during a nearly four-year-old Palestinian uprising.

(China Daily September 7, 2004)