An explosion tore through a resort hotel in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula where Israelis were vacationing at the end of a Jewish holiday Thursday, killing at least 35 people and wounding more than 160, officials said.

Israeli security officials said a car bomb caused the explosion, which was followed by two smaller blasts at other tourist sites in the Sinai. Witnesses gave reports that car bombs caused all three, but Egyptian officials said they had no evidence of terrorism.

The huge blast collapsed a 10-story wing of the luxury Hilton hotel built by Israel when it controlled Taba from 1967 to 1989.

Meir Frajun said his three children were playing one floor below the lobby when the blast tore through the building. He went down but found only two of them.

"Everything was filled with smoke," Frajun told The Associated Press after crossing into the nearby Israeli resort of Eilat. "We were hysterically looking for the child. In the end we found him sitting outside with an Arab guest of the hotel."

Four hours after the blast, Israel's military took command of the scene, according to the army spokeswoman, Brig. Gen. Ruth Yaron, but there were delays in sending Israeli forces and rescue workers across the tense border.

The explosions came a month after the Israeli government urged citizens not to visit Egypt, citing a concrete terrorism threat to tourists in an area. The warning, issued Sept. 9 by the counterterrorism center in Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's office, identified the Sinai Peninsula as the target of a potential attack.

The initial blast, about 10 p.m., rocked the Hilton hotel in the Taba resort, only yards from the Israeli border. "The whole front of the hotel has collapsed. There are dozens of people on the floor, lots of blood. It is very tense," witness Yigal Vakni told Army Radio. "I am standing outside of the hotel, the whole thing is burning, and they have nothing to put it out with."

A spokesman for rescue workers, Yerucham Mendola, said others were trapped in the debris.

The explosion could be heard and felt strongly a mile away, said Selma Abu el-Dahab, who works at another Taba hotel. She said a worker from her hotel returned from the Hilton and told of the blast before collapsing.

A car rental manager at the Hilton, Mohammed Saleh, said he was in the storeroom and couldn't see where the explosion originated. But he said that several people at the hotel claimed it was caused by a car bomb outside the reception area. Some witnesses reported seeing the wreckage of a car.

Secondary blasts

About midnight, two smaller blasts struck the area of Ras Shitan, a camping area near the town of Nuweiba south of Taba, witnesses said.

"I heard one very big explosion coming from Taba direction and then, after awhile, I heard two smaller explosions from Nuweiba," near Ras Shitan, said human-rights activist Abdel Raziq by telephone.

Amsalem Farrag, whose uncle and cousin own camps in Ras Shitan, said both told him that Israeli cars exploded outside their camps. The two blasts were five seconds apart, he said.

He said the camps were full of vacationing Israelis.

There were no immediate claims of responsibility on Islamic Web sites, where al-Qaeda-linked and other militant groups often post threats and claims. However, contributors to those sites were praising the explosions and linking them to a recent videotape said to have been issued by al-Qaeda's second in command, Ayman al-Zawahri.

That tape, aired by Al-Jazeera television Oct. 1, called for militants to organize and attack countries that had given Israel "means of survival." The tape urged holy warriors to fight Israelis and Americans before they enter Egypt.

Egyptian government spokesman Magdy Rady linked the blasts to the Israeli military operation against the Palestinians in the neighboring Gaza Strip, where 84 Palestinians have been killed. The Israeli offensive began Sept. 29 to stop militants from firing homemade rockets into Israel.

Rady added, "I think it is very probable that there is a link between these three explosions. It is very unlikely they happened by chance."

The security adviser to Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, Jibril Rajoub, told Al-Jazeera television that no Palestinian factions were responsible for the explosions.

Israelis evacuate

An Israeli foreign ministry spokeswoman said that Israel will help evacuate any of the 12,000 to 15,000 Israelis who wish to leave the Sinai. Israeli radio reported a nationwide call went out for surgeons to get to the Red Sea resort of Eilat in Israel, near Taba.

Vakni said most of the people at the Hilton were Israeli. A witness told Israel Radio that the hotel was filled with Israeli Arabs and Russian tourists.

"I was in the casino when it happened," he said. "There was a massive explosion, and the left wall came down. People started to run around like crazy."

Rady said at least 160 were injured in the Taba blast, and another seven Egyptians were injured in the Ras Shitan explosions. Israel's rescue service said it evacuated 103 injured to Israel.

Egyptians reportedly did not at first allow Israeli rescuers to enter the country but relented after Sharon instructed his diplomats to contact the Egyptians and expedite the crossing. The two countries signed a peace treaty in 1979, but relations have been chilly as a result of Israeli military actions in Palestinian areas.

Taba is the main crossing between Israel and Egypt, and it is the gateway for thousands of Israelis who travel to the hotels and resorts on the Red Sea. Thursday is the last day of the weeklong Jewish festival of Sukkot, when thousands of Israelis vacation in the Sinai.