Bomber kills 3 at W.Bank checkpoint

Reuters
By Muin Shadid

TULKARM, West Bank (Reuters) - A Palestinian suicide bomber blew himself up when Israeli troops tried to search him at a roadblock in the occupied West Bank on Thursday, killing an Israeli soldier and two other Palestinians.

A passenger who had unwittingly shared the same taxi as the bomber said soldiers stopped the car at an impromptu roadblock near the city of Tulkarm and asked young men to get out.

"The man got out slowly, closed his jacket and blew himself up," said Nafez Shahin, 48.

The army said the roadblock had been set up in response to intelligence warnings that a bomber was heading to Israel to strike during the current Hanukkah holiday.

One soldier was killed and at least two other Palestinians died, the army said. Three soldiers and six Palestinians were wounded.

The bombing dealt a blow to a shaky 10-month-old truce by militants that is due to expire on Saturday, the last day of 2005. Growing violence has put peacemaking hopes on hold and could influence forthcoming elections on both sides.

Israel Radio said the Islamic Jihad militant group carried out the attack. The same group was behind the last suicide bombing in Israel, when five Israelis were killed on December 6 at a shopping mall in the coastal city of Netanya.

Islamic Jihad officials in Gaza could not confirm that the group was responsible, but vowed to strike "in the depth of the Zionist entity" to retaliate for Israel's imposition since Wednesday of a "no-go zone" in the northern Gaza Strip.

Israeli troops sealed off Tulkarm and the government accused Islamic Jihad's leadership in Syria of planning the bombing.

"They are trying all the time to carry out operations," said Deputy Defense Minister Zeev Boim. "A massive disaster was prevented."

Deputy Palestinian Prime Minister Nabil Shaath condemned the bombing and said it was a particular tragedy that Palestinians had been killed. "We want such operations stopped," he said.

GAZA SHELLING

Israel shelled Gaza on Thursday to enforce the new buffer zone designed to prevent militants firing rockets from the Gaza Strip, abandoned by Israeli troops three months ago after 38 years of occupation.

Optimism that the pullout would be a step to reviving talks on Palestinian statehood has shrunk, with both Israelis and Palestinians busy preparing for elections early next year that could reshape the landscape for peacemaking.

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is battling to win a third term against rightist opponents who condemn his widely popular withdrawal from Gaza, saying it effectively rewarded Palestinians for their uprising and would encourage more attacks.

Israel said on Thursday it would continue the shelling and air strikes on Gaza for as long as it took to stop Palestinian militants firing rockets.

Palestinians condemned the buffer zone as a re-occupation of land evacuated by Israel and said police would remain deployed in the area despite Israeli requests that they leave for their own safety.

"The Israeli determination to implement this plan will widen the cycle of the conflict and will not achieve the goals which Israeli occupation forces seek to achieve," the Palestinian Interior Ministry said in a statement.

Any major surge of bloodshed could also complicate Palestinian parliamentary elections in January and even force a delay.

Earlier this week, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas tried to get militant leaders in Gaza to agree to halt the cross-border rocket fire and renew a pledge to follow a ceasefire that brought 10 months of relative calm.

But a leader of Islamic Jihad said he did not believe there would be a ceasefire extension.

(Additional reporting by Nidal al-Mughrabi in Gaza)