Sunday November 19, 4:06 PM  
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Palestinians form human shield to stop Israeli strike*

Several hundred Palestinians have formed a human shield around the Gaza
Strip home of a militant targeted by the Israeli army, prompting the
military to call off a threatened air strike.

Between 200 to 300 neighbors flocked to the family home of Wail Barud in
the Jabaliya refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip after receiving an
Israeli warning that the house would be destroyed, witnesses said.

Barud is a member of the radical Popular Resistance Committees, one of
three factions that claimed responsibility for the capture of an Israeli
corporal in June, triggering a massive Israeli offensive in Gaza.

Israel has been carrying out nightly raids against targets across the
Gaza Strip since militants' rockets killed an Israeli woman in the
nearby town of Sderot Wednesday.

An Israeli military spokesman told AFP that the strike against the home
in Jabaliya was called off after the crowds gathered.

"Basically yes," the spokesman said when asked if the raid was aborted.
"We don't want to hurt uninvolved civilians. The terrorists are using
uninvolved civilians as human shields.

"We'll continue to operate against terrorist infrastructure while
continuing to distinguish between the civilians and the terrorists," the
spokesman added.