GAZA CITY, July 14, 2006 (AFP) - Israeli tanks and armoured jeeps left the central Gaza Strip early Friday, although the air force and artillery continued to pound the Palestinian territory, witnesses and an army spokeswoman said.

Ground forces had been positioned on a road running from north to south near the Deir al-Balah refugee camp and the town of Khan Yunis.

"I can confirm that they have withdrawn from the central Gaza Strip. They've completed their mission there," an army spokeswoman said.

She said the only place where Israeli ground forces remain in the territory is in Dahaniya, in the south, near Gaza's former international airport that was destroyed by the army after the second Palestinian uprising erupted.

Israeli air strikes early Friday struck the house of an MP for the governing Palestinian movement Hamas in Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza Strip, and a bridge in central part of the territory, local security sources said.

The army confirmed the attack on the bridge and an aerial attack on a Hamas office in Gaza City, and that artillery from ground and naval gunboats had bombarded the northern and southern parts of the territory.

One Palestinian was killed late Thursday when an Israeli tank fired a shell at the vehicle moving in the direction of Israeli forces stationed in the Qarara in the southern Gaza Strip.

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