Israeli troops have shot dead two Palestinian fighters after they approached Israel’s border fence with the Gaza Strip, the military said.

An army spokesman on Friday said that the soldiers entered the Gaza Strip to intercept the men and shot them dead near the Karem Abu Salem crossing.

The military said that the men were carrying rifles, grenades and an improvised explosive device.

The incident just days after Israeli warplanes bombed targets in the Gaza Strip and a rocket was fired from the Palestinian territory towards an Israeli town.

Fighting has largely abated along the tense frontier since Israel’s devastating war on Gaza’s Hamas rulers early this year, but sporadic clashes and rocket fire have continued.

Gaza is still struggling to rebuild after the offensive Israel launched nearly five months ago and which claimed more than 1,300 lives in Gaza, including more than 900 civilians, according to Palestinian officials and human rights groups.

Separately, in the occupied West Bank, Israeli security forces have demolished a minor Jewish settlement outpost.
 
The move comes three days after Barack Obama, the US president, told Binyamin Netanyahu, Israel’s prime minister, that Israel must halt its illegal settlement activity.

The continued expansion of settlements has obstructed peace talks with the Palestinians.

Within hours of the outpost being removed the settlers began rebuilding.

"Every time they demolish it, it is rebuilt and that is what comforts me," Emuna Ben-Yona, one of the residents, was reported by the Associated Press as saying.

Micky Rosenfeld, a police spokesman, said that troops and police evicted settlers who had been staying in seven metal huts, and removed the structures.

He said there was no violent resistance and no arrests were made.
 
(Agencies)