At least 30 people are feared to be killed in a huge explosion late Thursday that rocked a hotel in Egypt's Red Sea resort of Taba neighboring Israel, Israeli TV stations reported.

The toll was released by Israeli police officials and that most of the dead were believed to be Israeli tourists, said the reports. Meanwhile, another seven people were killed in blasts shortly afterwards at two other Egyptian resorts southwest of Taba, said the reports.

Media reports also quoted hospital sources in Taba as saying that at least 100 people of different nationalities were killed or wounded in the three explosions which rocked the Taba region of Egypt's Sinai desert neighboring Israel.

Earlier Egyptian police sources said that the huge explosion that rocked the Hilton hotel in Taba killed at least 23 Israelis.

Israeli radio quoted security sources said the massive explosion which rocked the Hilton hotel on the border with Israel may have been a car bomb.

"We are not absolutely sure, but this is what it looks like," said one senior source.

But Egyptian public television said a gas leak was behind the explosion.

Witnesses at the scene said that part of the hotel had collapsed following the explosion.

A large number of people were wounded in the blast and many of them were being evacuated to an Israeli hospital in Eilat neighboring Taba, they added.

"The hotel is on fire on the eastern side, the entry point, the lobby. People are trying to get out," said witnesses.

(Xinhua News Agency October 8, 2004)