MIDDLE EAST: Three Israelis were killed yesterday when a Palestinian suicide bomber, who had been spotted in a gas station at a Jewish settlement in the West Bank, blew up as soldiers were firing at him. Eighteen people were injured, one seriously, in the blast in which the bomber also died.
In other incidents in the West Bank yesterday, the Israeli army shot dead four Palestinians, including a 15-year-old boy.
In the suicide attack, which took place shortly before midday at the settlement of Ariel, one of the largest in the West Bank, the gas station owner and one of the attendants approached a man they suspected of being a bomber. After discovering he had an explosives belt strapped to his waist, they grabbed his arms to stop him detonating it.
They then shouted "terrorist, terrorist" to alert nearby soldiers, several of whom approached the man and fired at him, at which point he exploded. It was not clear last night whether the bomber had detonated the explosives himself, or whether one of the bullets fired by the soldiers had set off the bomb.
"Three or four soldiers shouted at the man to stop. He raised his hands, stopped, then started walking backwards. They jumped on him, saw he had explosives, then they shot him and he exploded," said Yitzhak Zahavi, a 27-year-old soldier who was lightly wounded in the leg.
At the time of the bombing, the gas station was filled with troops travelling back to their bases after the weekend. Towards evening, two of the dead were identified as soldiers.
The militant Hamas group claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it had been carried out by Jamal Bustami, a 22-year-old second-year computers student at A-Najah University in Nablus.
"The Palestinian Authority is doing nothing to fight terror," charged Israeli Cabinet Secretary Mr Gideon Sa'ar. "So we have to continue to carry out operations to round up wanted men . . . this is what has brought about a significant drop in the level of terror." But Palestinian officials have argued that their security forces have been shattered by repeated Israeli offensives in the West Bank and so cannot move against militants. Mr Nabil Abu Rudeineh, an aide to Mr Arafat, said Israel was "responsible for what happens on the ground. Israel should immediately and fully withdraw from all occupied areas".
Shortly after the blast, three Palestinian militants were killed by Israeli troops in Nablus. Residents said two were shot by undercover troops, in what they referred to as an assassination. The army said that soldiers trying to carry out arrests had returned fire after being shot at.
A 15-year-old boy was shot and killed by troops in the northern West Bank town of Jenin, which was invaded by the army early on Friday in response to a suicide bombing in Israel last Monday that killed 14 passengers on a bus.
In Ramallah, meanwhile, Mr Arafat could face a rare political test today if a meeting of the Palestinian Legislative Council, meant to vote on a new cabinet proposed by the Palestinian leader, goes ahead as planned. It was still not clear last night if the army would issue permits to all parliament members to travel from the Gaza Strip and the West Bank to Ramallah.
Several weeks ago, Mr Arafat was forced to abandon a similar bid to push through new cabinet appointments when it became clear that he did not have a majority in parliament.