Four Israelis were killed yesterday by Palestinian gunmen in separate attacks in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, and two Palestinian teenagers were killed by Israeli troops in Gaza, a day after a meeting between the Prime Minister, Mr Ehud Barak, and President Clinton failed to generate any hope of a speedy end to what has become a seemingly unending spiral of violence.
Israel is to seal off all West Bank towns under Palestinian control, Israel's commander of central operations said yesterday.
"We are going to take the necessary security measures to improve the safety of the traffic and do our best to get all of those who are terrorists," Maj Gen Yitzhak Eitan told a news conference in Jerusalem. The move was effective immediately, officials said.
The towns affected were so-called "A-areas" under Palestinian control in the West Bank, including Ramallah, Nablus, Hebron, Bethlehem, Jericho, Qalqilya, Jenin and Tulkarem, said Mr Yarden Vatikay, a spokesman for the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF).
In the West Bank attack, two Palestinian gunmen driving a Fiat Uno on a road north of the city of Ramallah, unleashed a round of automatic gunfire as they first overtook a private Israeli vehicle, killing a woman passenger, and then an army bus, killing two soldiers. Seven people were also injured in the late-afternoon shooting. In Gaza, an Israeli driver was killed by Palestinian gunmen in the early evening near the Kissufin crossing into Israel.
Towards evening, Palestinian gunmen resumed fire on a Jewish neighbourhood in a disputed part of Jerusalem, which has become an almost daily target. Israeli troops returned fire.
Palestinian hospital officials said the two Palestinian teenagers who died yesterday were killed near Khan Younis in the southern end of the Gaza Strip by gunfire from Israeli troops. More than 200 people have died in the seven weeks of fighting - over 180 Palestinians, and 25 Israelis.
Over the last few days Palestinian rock throwing has subsided, but shooting has increased. The latest attacks came only four days after Israel's assassination of Hussein Abayat, commander in a Palestinian militia associated with the Fatah party of President Yasser Arafat.
Mr Marwan Barghouti, a senior Fatah leader in the West Bank, said the Palestinians were planning to shift their attacks from areas under their control to Israeli-controlled parts of the West Bank. "This is a legitimate action in the Intifada against the Israeli conquest," a militia member said yesterday after the West Bank shooting.
Mr Danny Yatom, a senior adviser to Mr Barak, blamed Mr Arafat and the Palestinian Authority for "not doing everything they can to stop the violence. We will act to substantially reduce the violence," he said, without going into detail.
Despite Mr Arafat's meeting with Mr Clinton last Thursday, and the fact that Mr Barak was in Washington on Sunday, the chances of salvaging the Middle East peace process appear to be dwindling fast, especially with both sides now locked in a cycle of attack and counter-attack. After his meeting with Mr Clinton, the Israeli Prime Minister said Israel was "ready for negotiations, but not through dictates of force."
The Palestinians have also set out preconditions for a return to talks: a freeze on Jewish settlement construction and involvement of the United Nations and Russia in the peace process.
Even though close to 200 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli soldiers in the seven weeks of fighting, Mr Barak has been under growing public pressure to adopt a harsher response. But the Prime Minister fears that a serious escalation in the conflict would completely snuff out whatever slim hopes remain of a peace deal with the Palestinians.
Meanwhile, Leah Rabin, a tireless crusader for peace ever since the assassination of her husband, Yitzhak Rabin, will be laid to rest tomorrow in Jerusalem. Mrs Rabin died of lung cancer in a Tel Aviv hospital on Sunday.
A point of contention surrounding the funeral has been the question of whether Mr Arafat, who has maintained contact with Mrs Rabin, even during the latest round of violence, would request to attend the funeral.
Officials close to Mr Barak said that Mr Arafat would not be permitted to attend, and some Israeli politicians were outraged by the idea.
After hearing of Mrs Rabin's death, Mr Arafat said it was "so sad to lose this woman, the wife of my partner in the peace of the brave, Yitzhak Rabin".
Several international figures will attend the funeral, including Mrs Hillary Rodham Clinton and the Russian Foreign Minister, Mr Igor Ivanov.