Abbas denounces 'Zionist enemy'

Palestinian presidential front-runner Mahmoud Abbas on denounced Israel as the “Zionist enemy” today – his harshest language yet on the campaign trail -, after Israeli tank shells slammed into a strawberry patch, killing seven Palestinians, many of them children.

Israel insisted the shells hit militants who were firing mortar shells at Israeli targets, but a senior army commander apologised for civilian casualties. It was the bloodiest strike in Gaza in three months.