A huge blaze broke out at an Israeli chemical factory adjacent to an oil refinery in the northern port city of Haifa Tuesday, but there were no casualties, officials and witnesses said. Firefighters managed to bring the blaze under control and National Fire Chief Shimon Roma told Israel Radio there was no real threat of it spreading to the nearby oil refinery. However it could take hours to put the fire out, he added.

The fire occurred in a building housing non-poisonous chemical fertilizer at Haifa Petrochemicals and despite heavy smoke blanketing the area there was no immediate danger, said Haifa police spokesman Haim Poniemunsky.

He would not say whether police suspected an attack, although Israeli media said the inferno was likely the result of a technical mishap.

Gershon Zalderman, a chief firefighter in the Haifa area, told Israel Radio the fire brigade rushed to the scene after receiving a report of an explosion.

But police said they had no immediate evidence of an explosion and were still investigating how the fire started.

"There was a huge cloud of smoke that rose above the Haifa port," said witness Reuven Oren, who was on the beach when the fire broke out. "Luckily the wind is now blowing the smoke out to sea."

In May, suspected Palestinian resistance activists tried to set ablaze a main Israeli fuel pumping depot near Tel Aviv by planting a bomb on a tanker truck and setting it off by remote control. Workers put out that fire before it could spread.

Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip have been fighting an uprising against Israeli occupation since September 2000 when peace talks stalled.

PHOTO CAPTION

Unidentified relatives wheel the body of 19 year-old Hamas resistance activist Abdel Karim Shabat through Shifa hospital in Gaza city, Monday, Dec. 16, 2002. Israeli soldiers shot dead two armed Hamas fighters who were trying to infiltrate Israel (AP Photo/Adel Hana)
- Dec 16 11:57 AM ET