Defiant Palestinian resistance activists fired rockets into Israel after 11 Palestinians were murdered in a massive raid into Gaza, while in the West Bank a resistance man was killed in a car blast blamed on Israel.And in Nablus, the major city in the north of the reoccupied West Bank, two Palestinians were shot dead in a major Israeli sweep of the city's old centre, the Casbah.

The death toll of almost 29 months of the Palestinian uprising spiked sharply as up to 50 Israeli tanks backed by helicopters staged yet another raid into Gaza City to smash metal workshops allegedly producing ordnance for the resistance group Hamas.

In heavy fighting on Gaza's streets, the occupation army destroyed several buildings. Palestinian officials said three of the dead -- two brothers and a cousin in their early 20s -- were killed when a demolished building collapsed on them.

Three others were security officials on patrol to prevent Hamas firing their homemade Qassam missiles at Israel when an Apache helicopter blasted their car, the officials said.

Hours after the raid, Hamas fired four rockets on the southern Israeli town of Sderot, just across the Gaza border, injuring three people, the occupation army said.

It was the first time since January 26 that the rockets have been fired, as Palestinian Authority security forces had been trying to prevent them and avoid further devastating Israel raids into the densely populated Gaza Strip, which unlike the West Bank has not been reoccupied.

In response to the rocket attack, Israeli forces set up roadblocks cutting Gaza into three isolated sectors. A Palestinian farmer was later seriously wounded by Israeli gunfire while working his land near Khan Yunis in the south.

The Palestinian leadership called on the United Nations to condemn the raid. "It is high time that the UN Security Council condemned the massacre of Palestinian civilians," a leadership statement said.

The French and Russian governments also expressed deep concern about the Israeli raids.

Two Palestinians, one a mentally ill young man out on the street during an occupation army-imposed curfew, were shot dead in Nablus as the occupation army moved into the city centre to conduct house searches, Palestinian officials said.

The other death was a youth who threw a petrol bomb at the occupation army.

Sixteen other people were injured in the clashes, medics said.

And in Jenin, to the north of Nablus, a resistance activist from Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, was blown to pieces when his car exploded.

Palestinian security officials and Al-Aqsa members blamed Israel, saying the explosion was an assassination carried out with a remote-control device. Israel has killed dozens of resistance activists in such targeted hits.

The man was identified as Taer Zakani, 22. The group vowed to avenge his death as Israeli forces staged a swift raid into the city after the blast to quell any reaction.

The latest violence has further dimmed hopes for the much-touted "roadmap" for Middle East peace, which is being proposed by the so-called "quartet" of the United States, United Nations, European Union and Russia.

That plan has yet to be made public and the quartet said it would wait to announce it until after the January 28 Israeli election, which saw Sharon easily re-elected on a pledge to maintain his hard line on the Palestinians

PHOTO CAPTION

Israeli army soldiers set up explosives as they prepare to blow up a metal workshop in Gaza City, early Wednesday Feb.19, 2003. (AP Photo/Israeli Defense