Israeli occupation forces with tanks and helicopters moved deep into Gaza City early Sunday, killing 10 Palestinians in exchanges of fire, a large-scale assault just three days before Israel's election. It was the highest toll in Gaza in five months, and the incursion was the deepest into Gaza City in more than two years of fighting. Tanks were seen a half a mile from Palestine Square, which marks the center of the city of about 300,000.

Late Saturday, Israeli tanks entered the city from three directions, as helicopter gunships fired machine guns at targets and at crowds of people in the streets, including gunmen, witnesses and security officials said.

Ten Palestinians were killed and 42 wounded, eight critically, hospital officials said. It was the bloodiest day in the Gaza Strip since August, when 13 people were killed in an Israeli attack on the southern city of Khan Younis. Casualties were being brought to Gaza's Shifa Hospital in cars and ambulances.

Early Sunday, witnesses said nine Israeli tanks took up positions in the center of Beit Hanoun, a town at the northern edge of the Gaza Strip, where Israeli occupation forces blew up four bridges a day earlier. Palestinians have been firing rockets and mortars from Beit Hanoun at internationally illegal Jewish settlements and nearby Israeli towns in recent days.

Palestinian legislator Ziad Abu Amr said he saw 10 tanks drive through his street. Another resident, Mohammed Tafesh, 29, said electricity was cut to the neighborhood. From mosque loudspeakers across the city, resistance men were called into the streets to wage "holy war" against the Israelis.

An Israeli Missile Starts a Huge Fire in the Shajaiyeh Neighborhood

A missile fired by an Israeli helicopter started a huge fire in the Shajaiyeh neighborhood in eastern Gaza City, witnesses said. Firefighters were battling the blaze in the industrial area.

The Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, said its fighters blew up three Israeli tanks with explosives. The Israeli occupation army denied the claim.

Occupation Troops Demolish More Palestinian Homes

Israeli occupation forces blew up the two-story house of a Hamas activist and were approaching the houses of two others involved in an attack on a Jewish settlement in Gaza, Palestinians said.

Also, several metal workshops in the same area were blown up. Israelis charge that Palestinians use the workshops to produce weapons, including mortars and rockets.

As the Israeli incursion in Gaza City was in progress, Maj. Gen. Abdel Razek Majaidie, head of Palestinian security in Gaza, accused Sharon of "adding a new page to his dark record. This crime against innocent civilians is another part of his continuous war against the Palestinian people and Palestinian homeland."

Sharon's Election Campaign Benefits From Violence

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, running for re-election, stood to benefit from an upsurge of violence as Tuesday's elections approached. His hard-line Likud party and its allies are ahead in the polls, and Sharon is expected to form a new government after the voting, but Likud leaders say they're concerned that they might still not have enough electoral strength to form a stable ruling coalition.

Palestinian Talks Continue 'Smoothly'

In Cairo talks were progressing "smoothly" among Palestinian political and resistance leaders meeting for the second day Saturday in an effort to unify their stance on the uprising against Israel.

After more than four hours of talks, the 12 Palestinian groups agreed on an agenda that would discuss the political visions of the groups, managing the struggle against Israel, Palestinian national unity and mechanisms to follow up on agreements made in the Egyptian capital.

It's clear that there are understandings and that things are going smoothly," Osama Hamdan, spokesman for the radical Hamas group, told The Associated Press in a telephone interview from undisclosed location in Cairo.

The talks, under the leadership of Egypt's chief of intelligence, Omar Suleiman, bring together more factions than any Palestinian meeting in 20 years.

Israeli officials have said they do not expect a positive outcome from the Cairo talks.

Other Palestinian groups attending the talks include members of the Palestine Liberation Organization, including Arafat's mainstream Fatah movement, and Syrian-backed resistance groups such as the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command and the Saaqa faction.

PHOTO CAPTION

Palestinians wheel Saed Kehal on a stretcher to the emergency room at Shifa hospital in Gaza city, Sunday Jan. 26, 2003, after shrapnel from an Israeli helicopter shell wounded him. (AP Photo/Ad