ARABS-ISRAEL - Oct 3 - Sharon Vows To Expand Gaza Raid.

Israeli PM Ariel Sharon vows to expand an offensive in Gaza that has killed 55 Palestinians until militants stop firing rockets into Israel. Militants fired another rocket into the Jewish state Oct 3 in a campaign that has fuelled criticism within Israel of Sharon's plan to pull out of occupied Gaza. It caused no casualties and Israel killed the militants with its own missile as they tried to flee in a donkey cart. UN Sec Gen Kofi Annan urged Israel to halt its four-day-old raid and Palestinian leaders to stop the rockets. In a statement issued Annan said: "The Secretary General calls on the government of Israel to halt its military incursions into the Gaza Strip, which have led to the deaths of scores of Palestinians, among them many civilians, including children". Sharon, pursuing one of the biggest and bloodiest operations in four years of conflict, needs to show he can stop rocket strikes like one that killed two Israeli toddlers Sep 29 to counter rightists who say that evacuating troops and Jewish settlers from Gaza will encourage more attacks. Nearly 200 tanks and armoured vehicles have seized nine square km (three square miles) of the northern strip and pushed deep into teeming Jabalya refugee camp, a militant hotbed. Ten other tanks pushed into nearby Beit Hanoun, witnesses said. Later into the night Israeli attack aircraft fired two missiles at a militant target in Shijaia, east of Gaza City, seriously wounding a senior member of the Hamas military wing and another militant, medics said. Sharon told Army Radio the army would expand the "buffer zone" in northern Gaza to spare Israeli towns from rockets. Sharon said: "Evacuating the Gaza Strip is a plan that will be carried out and all orders have been given to ensure that there will be no fire at the time of the evacuation and I believe not after that either". Israel's army chief said the operation could last weeks. The latest casualties brought the Palestinian death toll to 55, at least 34 of them militants. Three Israelis have been killed, two soldiers and a woman jogger. Armoured bulldozers demolished homes, citrus orchards, a clothing factory and a kindergarten in the northern Gaza Strip, witnesses said. The army says it is destroying cover used for firing rockets. Palestinians call it collective punishment. Israeli troops killed three militants from Hamas and the Islamic Jihad group early Oct 3. The army said it opened fire when it saw the men planting a bomb. Another militant was shot dead in Jabalya. Medics said a 13-year-old boy died of wounds after being shot in Jabalya. The army was checking the report. Palestinian witnesses said a deaf man was shot dead on his balcony. The army said he was suspected of being a spotter for the militants. Two militants from the Popular Resistance Committees were killed moments after firingOct 3 rocket. The army said it hit them as they left with a cart laden with projectiles. Gunbattles subsided somewhat in Jabalya as the army tightened its grip and Israeli drones buzzed overhead to direct fire. Addressing the zone under siege by radio, Palestinian Pres Yasser Arafat urged people to stand firm "against those racists, barbarians and criminals". But his leadership has signalled that militants should stop rocket attacks to avoid "giving the Israelis a pretext". The Arab League's council urged its member nations to "raise the dangerous escalation" in violence at the UN Gen Assembly and Security Council. Militant Palestinian factions want to give the impression they drove Israel out of the Gaza Strip if there is a pullout from the territory occupied since the 1967 war. Israel's army is determined to smash them first. "The Qassam rockets will not stop as long as the occupation exists", Mushir Al Masri, a spokesman for Hamas, a militant group sworn to Israel's destruction, told a rally of 4,000 in Gaza City late Oct 3. Another Hamas leader, Ismail Haniyeh, hinted that the militants might be ready to reconsider rocket fire. He told reporters they "would seriously study their methods", if Israel halted all military action in Gaza, including killing militants.