Global General

6 Palestinians killed in Gaza tunnel blast

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2010-05-30 09:15

Palestinian men check the body of a Palestinian who was killed in a smuggling tunnel under the border between Egypt and Gaza Strip May 29, 2010. Six Palestinians were killed and several injured when a cooking gas canister smuggled from Egypt exploded in a tunnel, medical workers said.[Photo/Xinhua]??

GAZA - The death toll of the gas canister blast in an underground tunnel on the Gaza-Egypt borders in the southern town of Rafah raised to six, Palestinian medical sources said.

The gas cylinder was being smuggled to Gaza this afternoon before it exploded.

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Two workers went missing for a while before rescue crews found them dead inside the tunnel that caved in. Meanwhile, a hospital official in Rafah town said the four people who reported to the hospital have died due to suffocation.

According to Gaza right groups, 146 Palestinian workers were killed in tunnel cave-ins from sporadic accidents in the tunnels that snake under the Gaza-Egypt borders.

Palestinians use tunnels to bring in goods, food stuff and fuel into the besieged Hamas-ruled enclave, after all of its crossings with Israel and Egypt were shut down since the Islamic movement took over the Strip forcibly in 2007.

Contrary to Palestinian claims that the tunnels are meant to alleviate the Israeli siege, Israel says these underground passageways are used to bring in weapons and ammunition to Gaza militants groups to be used against the Jewish state.