(dpa) - Four Palestinians were killed and 14 wounded on Friday when a tunnel under the border between the southern Gaza Strip town of Rafah and Egypt collapsed, medics and witnesses said.
Witnesses said that several Palestinians were digging a tunnel east of Rafah town under the border between Gaza Strip and Egypt, adding that the tunnel has suddenly collapsed while around 20 people were into it.
Mo'aweya Hassanein, chief of emergency in the Palestinian Ministry of Health, told reporters that Gaza hospitals received the bodies of four people, adding that 14 others wounded.
More than 10 Palestinians have been killed in the past few months in tunnels designed to smuggle goods into the enclave.
Tunnelling business in the Gaza Strip increased after Israel imposed a tight blockade on the area after the Islamic Hamas movement routed President Mahmoud Abbas' security forces and took control of the enclave last year.
Israel, which claims Palestinians are also using the underground tunnels to smuggle weapons into the Gaza Strip, has repeatedly asked Egypt to stop arms smuggling through underground tunnels into the Gaza Strip.