In the largest Israeli military loss in eighteen months of fighting, 13 reserve soldiers were killed in the Jenin refugee camp on Tuesday morning. Explosive devices were detonated as the soldiers approached a building in search of terrorists. 7 are wounded, one seriously. A Golani Brigade soldier died in Jenin in overnight fighting. In addition, an officer died of wounds suffered in Nablus.

PM Ariel Sharon announced that Operation Defensive Shield would continue until Israel has destroyed the terror infrastructure. "It was a difficult day," Sharon said. "This battle is a battle for survival of the Jewish people, for survival of the state of Israel." He termed "a tragic mistake" the decision today of U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell to meet with Yasser Arafat in Ramallah. "Every meeting with him encourages him to continue with terror." He said he recognized that the U.S. has problems, but added that while "they have problems, we have funerals."

Gunfire exchanges between Israeli troops and armed Palestinians were ongoing in an area described by the Israeli media as a "70 meter by 70 meter" (230 feet by 230 feet) concentration of houses. Many explosive devices were thrown at soldiers. Brig. Gen. Eyal Shlein said the armed men "seem to have decided to fight to the last, to make the battle as bloody as possible" and that several blew themselves up in suicide attacks on soldiers, the Associated Press reported.

The soldiers killed were not in the area of most concentrated battle, but were on a search mission. They reportedly walked into an ambush, with multiple bombs detonating, killing several soldiers outright. Then snipers shot on them from above. Another bomb brought down another building on the soldiers.

Ron Drori, 30, from Jerusalem, said the soldiers entered the area at first light and initially met no resistance. "The commander checked if we could enter the three houses and take them over, and decided that it was too dangerous. We went into a narrow alley. Suddenly, a device exploded between the soldiers. I don't know where it came from," he said, "and immediately, there was another bomb. Almost immediately, they started firing on us from all directions."

A group of naval commandos sent in rescue them came under withering gunfire and were hit by additional explosive charges. Initially three soldiers were believed to have been kidnapped, but the rescue force managed to remove all of the bodies.

The names of nine of the thirteen soldiers killed in Jenin have been released: Captain Ya'akov Azulai, 30, from Migdal Ha'emek; First Lieutenant Dror Bar, 28, from Kibbutz Einat; First Lieutenant Yoel Eyal, 28, from Be'er Sheva; First Sergeant Major Yoram Levy, 33, from Elad; First Sergeant Major Tiran Arazi, 33, from Hadera; First Sergeant Major Avner Yaskov, 34, from Be'er Sheva; Sergeant Major Menashe Hava, 23, from Kfar Sava; Sergeant Major Eyal Zimmerman, 22, from Ra'anana, and Major Oded Golomb, 22, from Beit Yehoshua; Sergeant Major Ronen Alshochat, 27, from Ramle; Sergeant Major Shmuel Danny Meizlish, 27, from Moshav Hemed, and Sergeant Major Amit Poseidon, 22, from Bat Yam. Maj. Assaf Assouline, 30, from Tel Aviv, was killed in the Nablus casbah.

Israeli helicopters reportedly pounded the camp with missiles, and Israeli officials estimated that more than 100 Palestinians were killed there in recent days. Palestinian sources put the death toll at more than 150 in Jenin alone. 22 Israelis have died in Jenin since Operation Defensive Shield began.

It was reported by Ha'aretz early in the day that Foreign Affairs Minister Shimon Peres had referred in private to the tough battles in the Jenin refugee camp as a "massacre," media sources reported. The Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman issued a statement clarifying that Peres's remarks on the situation in Jenin were completely distorted. "The Foreign Minister expressed his concern that Palestinian propaganda is liable to accuse Israel to the effect that a massacre - and not a harsh battle against armed terrorists - took place in Jenin," the statement said.

Army officers expressed grave reservations over the operation there and said, "When the world sees the pictures of what we have done there, it will do us immense damage," the paper said.

"However many wanted men we kill in the refugee camp, and however much of the terror infrastructure we expose and destroy there, there is still no justification for causing such great destruction," one officer told Ha'aretz.

However, a wounded officer identified by Channel One as Major Ilan said that the fighting was house to house, with the Palestinian fighters taking over houses inhabited by women and children, using the civilians for cover. "They were like suicide attackers," he said, shouting "Allah hu-Akhbar" and trying to blow themselves up with explosives belts next to soldiers even after the IDF had allowed them to emerge unharmed.

After the news of the thirteen soldiers killed was released, military officials and defense analysts noted that the primary reason for the high number of Israeli casualties and the slowness of the operation in Jenin was Israeli sensitivity to the loss of civilian life. "What caused the heavy losses," said military correspondent Ron Ben-Yishai, "is the fact that the IDF soldiers cannot use airforce or bulldozers because of the fear of causing harm to the innocent civilian population."

Ben-Yishai dismissed claims of a massacre, and said the Palestinians wanted to have it both ways, describing the Jenin battle as a heroic fight to the finish and also as the scene of a massacre. "The Palestinians want, on the one hand, to describe Jenin as heir Stalingrad and on the other hand as their Sabra and Shatilla. They refused Israeli invitations to clear the corpses from the streets so that we can expect that in the coming days in Jenin, like in Nablus, that they will depict the horror of the corpses for the media."

IDF Deputy Territories Operations Commander Brig.-Gen. Kamil Abu Rukun, told Army Radio, "It's not the Israeli army that is delaying the evacuation of Palestinian wounded in the territories. We requested from local Red Cross and [Palestinian] Red Crescent authorities to be involved in this matter, giving them all the opportunities and availability to assist, and they refused for their own inhumane... propaganda reasons," he said.

"From their point of view, Jenin is like Masada," a senior IDF officer told Yediot Aharonot, referring to the Judean Desert mountaintop where Jewish fighters killed themselves rather than surrender to the Romans in the year 73.

"They are very determined not to give up, and they don't plan to surrender, even after they we called on them with frequently with loudspeakers to turn themselves in," the officer added.

© 2001-2002 Koret Communications Ltd. All rights reserved. Terms of Use.