"Why did they kill him? He was unarmed and hadn't even hurled stones," wailed the mother outside the morgue where laid the lifeless body of her 28-year-old son Nidal Mattar.
"May God take revenge on Israel and (Israeli Prime Minister Ariel) Sharon,"
cried Um Fadi, a mother of six wearing a traditional embroidered Palestinian dress and a loosely tied white veil over her head.
Mattar, a captain in the Palestinian security forces, died with another two civilians Friday morning when an Israeli helicopter fired a missle on the Al-Sikka neighborhood of the Jabaliya refugee camp, in the northern Gaza Strip.
The impoverished camp, home to 100,000 Palestinian refugees, has been the scene of fierce fighting between gunmen and Israeli troops since heavy armour rolled into the northern Gaza Strip three days ago to prevent militant rocket attacks on southern Israel.
Forty-five Palestinians and five Israelis have died since.
Mattar had spent 10 years in an Israeli jail before being released a few months before the start of the Palestinian uprising, or intifada, four years ago.
"I would have preferred he stayed in prison where I could visit him. He's gone now and I'll never see him again," sighed Um Ali whose family originally hails from a village now in Israel.
Mohammed Abu Layla, 17, said he witnessed the deadly air raid.
"I was in the area. I did not recognize Nidal the martyr when I saw him because his head was half gone," he said.
The slain security man and nine other Palestinians from Jabaliya, who died in the last 24 hours, were laid to rest in the Martyrs' Cemetery after Friday's noon prayers.
Around 30,000 angry mourners followed the funeral procession as they cried for vengeance against Israel.
Israeli choppers were flying overhead and fired at armed militants in the crowd who rushed to take cover and shoot back from nearby alleys.
Forty houses were destroyed in Jabaliya where the water, telephone and electricity networks were also badly damaged.
Sharon ordered the army to step up the operation codenamed "Days of Penitence" Thursday night, a day after two Israeli toddlers were killed in rocket attack on Sderot, just across the Gaza border.