gelatik
29.05.02, 22:14
Israeli Army Continues Bethlehem Occupation, 3 Israeli Settlers Killed
BETHLEHEM At least four Israelis, 3 of them settlers in the West Bank, and two
Palestinians were killed late Tuesday, May 28, as Israel continued to mount
raids on West Bank towns, abducting scores of Palestinians.
The Israeli occupation army continued to occupy Bethlehem for a second day
running, after declaring it a “closed military zone”, banning journalists from
entering, setting up roadblocks around the town and imposing a curfew, Agence
France-Presse (AFP) reported.
And on Tuesday night, Israeli troops moved into the West Bank city of Ramallah
and conducted house-to-house searches as they hunted for a local Hamas leader,
a Palestinian security official said.
The latest hostilities came as the Palestinian intifada, or uprising, entered
its 21st month and two senior U.S. officials prepared to head for the region in
yet another bid by Washington to get the peace process moving again.
They also coincided with word that Palestinian president Yasser Arafat plans to
shake up the Palestinian leadership within 10 days and hold presidential and
legislative elections in December 2002.
Three Orthodox Jewish students and a Palestinian were killed in a shoot-out on
Tuesday, evening in the Jewish settlement of Itmar near the West Bank town of
Nablus and one other settler was lightly injured, settlers there said.
They said the Palestinian was shot dead by an Israeli security guard after
infiltrating and attacking the settlement.
A Palestinian was killed in Jenin when shooting broke out as Israeli tanks,
backed up by helicopters, rolled into the town, security officials said. The
army withdrew around midday (0900 GMT).
In addition, an Israeli was killed as his car came under fire near the Jewish
settlement of Ofra, north of Ramallah. Settlers said he had been shot by a
Palestinian but a Palestinian ambulance driver said the shots could have come
from an Israeli army roadblock only 20 meters (yards) away.
Israel continued its new tactics of frequent, short-term raids into Palestinian
self-rule towns to search for suspected resistance activists.
The army says it has seized dozens of suspected activists in its raids so far,
while Palestinians have accused Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon of using
the heavy-handed tactics to erode Palestinian autonomy and wipe out the 1993
Oslo peace accords which he had opposed.
An army spokesman said 11 Palestinians wanted for “terrorist activities” had
been abducted in Jenin, including the regional head of the Islamic resistance
movement group Hamas, Khaled el Had, the army said.
He said eight other Palestinians had been abducted in the West Bank - two in
Hebron, two in Beit Jala near Bethlehem, two at Azzun near Qalqilya and two in
the village of Beit Anan north of Jerusalem. They were handed over to the
internal security service Shin Beth for interrogation.
A Palestinian official told AFP the Palestinian governor of east Jerusalem,
Jamil Nasser, had been abducted by Israeli police and secret service agents as
he was visiting the offices of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO)
political commissioner for Jerusalem affairs in the Israeli-occupied east of
the city.
Meanwhile, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said in Italy that Washington
was not ready to put forward a peace plan for the Middle East. “We are not, at
this point, prepared to table an American plan with specific deadlines,” Powell
said.
U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Near East Affairs William Burns is due to
begin a trip to the region in Egypt on Wednesday, May 29, before going to
Israel, the Palestinian territories, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Syria and Lebanon, a
senior U.S. official said. Powell said Burns would consult Middle Eastern
officials on a “political way forward.”
His visit will dovetail with one by E.U. foreign policy chief Javier Solana,
who will also visit the same countries. It will precede a visit by CIA chief
George Tenet, who will be looking at ways to reorganize the Palestinian
Authority's security apparatus.
