THE AIR OFFENSIVE

Evening Post, Volume CXXXV, Issue 21, 26 January 1943, Page 5

THE AIR OFFENSIVE

ATTACKS ON SICILY

(Rec. 10 a.m.) RUGBY, Jan. 25. A large-scale fighter-bomber attack was carried out on the Ben Gardane landing ground. A Junkers 88 was shot down in combat and damage was inflicted on grounded aircraft. On Saturday night light bombers attacked landing grounds and started fires at Medehin. Dispersed vehicles in the frontier area were also successfully attacked. Palermo Harbour, in Sicily, was bombed on, the same night and fires were started. Two south-bound enemy merchantmen were torpedoed and set on fire by our aircraft north of Sicily. One broke in two after an explosion, and the other was left burning furiously. One of the escorting destroyers received a direct bomb hit. Extensive intruder operations were continued against shipping off Cape Bon and Pantellaria and against targets in Sicily and vehicles on the coastal road to Tunisia. Yesterday, Allied fighter-bombers attacked various targets on the south coast of Sicily, and hits were scored on railway tracks and buildings. From the above operations two of our aircraft dfd not return.—B.O.W.

reached the fortified Mareth Line, says Reuters Cairo correspondent. According to Morocco radio, part of Rommel's mechanised forces are in confusion on the coast road at a point sixty miles west of Tripoli. The French camel corps destroyed seventeen tanks in repelling an Axis attack in southern Tunisia, designed to open a passage for Rommel.