Three Americans killed in Gaza attack

American citizens were advised to leave the Gaza Strip following a deadly attack on a convoy of US diplomats.

Three Americans, security guards for diplomats, were killed in the attack near the Palestinian town of Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza Strip.

Several hours after the bombing, US investigators were attacked by Palestinian stone throwers and sped away as their cars were pelted by rocks.

A statement posted on the US embassy's Web site after the attack said Americans should leave the Gaza Strip.

"The United States government recommends that all US citizens depart the area as soon as possible, while avoiding the area of the attack," the statement read.

"We are asking the Israeli government to facilitate the evacuation of any American citizen wishing to leave the Gaza Strip."

The US ambassador to Israel, Dan Kurtzer, said the FBI would send bomb experts to investigate. "We were shocked by this latest terrorist outrage," Kurtzer told reporters. "The United States government will investigate fully."

Kurtzer said the diplomats had been en route to Gaza City to interview Palestinian applicants for Fulbright scholarships. He said those killed were contract employees for the US Embassy in Tel Aviv, but did not release their names.

Israeli radio reports said CIA officials were travelling in the convoy, but the CIA spokesman in Washington, Bill Harlow, said that "there were no CIA people involved."

Kurtzer said that up to 400 Americans, some of them of Palestinian descent, work in the Gaza Strip.

Most watched News videos