Fighting rages as Palestinians bury 11-year-old boy

Israeli troops and Palestinian gunmen have been battling in the Gaza Strip.

The fighting comes as hundreds of Palestinians vowed revenge at the funeral of an 11-year-old boy shot a day earlier.

Palestinian militants threw more than 60 grenades and fired automatic weapons at Israeli outposts in Rafah, near the border with Egypt, the Israeli army says.

Nearby, the Palestinians buried Khalil Ibrahim al-Mugrabi, who was shot in the head on Saturday near an area where Palestinian militants and Israeli soldiers had been exchanging fire.

Before the burial, the boy's coffin was taken to his home in Rafah refugee camp, and his mother fainted.

At the cemetery, armed men fired into the air as a masked man told the crowd that the militant Islamic group Hamas had 10 suicide bombers who are ready to blow themselves up inside Israel.

Palestinian witnesses said al-Mugrabi and two other children were shot by Israeli soldiers from a guard tower some 350 yards from where they had been playing.

The Israeli army has not commented on the boy's death.

Two Palestinian men have been shot today when they failed to stop at an Israeli military checkpoint at Khan Yunis, also in the southern Gaza Strip, hospital officials say. Their injuries are moderate, the hospital says.

In the West Bank city of Hebron, a Hamas activist was dragged from his vehicle while driving with his family, and his wife blames Israeli security forces.

Ayoub Sharawi, a prominent Hamas figure in Hebron, was driving to his clothes shop in Hebron with his wife and three of their children when his car was stopped and he was forced into a four-wheel-drive vehicle. The Israelis had no immediate comment on the incident.