THE MIDDLE EAST: Israeli troops shot dead four Hamas militants in Nablus, and a Palestinian gunman opened fire at random on Israelis in central Jerusalem, injuring 30 people, as Middle East violence spiralled further out of control yesterday and the Bush administration appeared to be giving up its peace efforts.
Although Israel withdrew its troops yesterday morning from Tulkarm, 30 hours after taking control of the entire West Bank city, the rest of the day saw a vicious procession of shootings and killings, with both sides expecting more violence today and in the foreseeable future.
Hamas is threatening "all-out" war, Mr Yasser Arafat's main Fatah faction of the PLO is no longer pledging to honour Mr Arafat's ceasefire calls, and a full-scale military confrontation between Israel and Mr Arafat's Palestinian Authority (PA) seems imminent.
Israel said it killed the four Hamas activists during a gun-battle when its troops, acting on intelligence information, raided a Nablus apartment being used as a weapons-factory. Military officers said they found 100 explosive devices, materials for chemical weapons attacks, and explosives belts for "imminent use" by suicide bombers, and described the factory as the largest they had ever uncovered in the West Bank.
Officials said two of the four men killed - Mr Jasser Samro and Mr Nissam Abu Ros - were the Hamas bombmakers who built the devices used by suicide bombers at Jerusalem's Sbarro pizzeria and Tel Aviv's Dolphinarium last year. Palestinian officials claimed all four of the men were killed in cold blood. Local medics said three of the bodies were found on mattresses on the floor, and the fourth in a shower.
Two thousand Hamas supporters marched on Nablus jail, demanding the PA release more than 20 Hamas activists it is holding. One of the demonstrators was shot in the head by PA policemen. Later, though, the PA released one of the activists, a brother of one of the four men killed.
In a statement, Hamas declared "an all-out war against the Zionist army and the settlers, by all means and in all places". Hamas claimed it was behind the Jerusalem shooting yesterday afternoon. But the military wing of Fatah also took responsibility - as it has for a series of recent attacks that have killed 10 Israelis - claiming it is avenging Israel's killing of Mr Raed Karmi, one of its leading militants, last week.
The gunman, Mr Saed Ramadan (24), from a village outside Nablus, opened fire at pedestrians on Jerusalem's main Jaffa Road. He injured 30, six of them seriously, at a bus stop and in a clothes shop, before he was shot dead by a policeman. Mr Hussein a-Sheikh, the political leader of the Fatah movement in the West Bank, which has hitherto upheld a mid-December ceasefire call by Mr Arafat, said he could no longer "stand in front of the friends of Raed Karmi and tell them not to avenge his blood". Mr Marwan Kanafani, a spokesman for Mr Arafat, blamed the "mass destruction" and "massacres" being perpetrated under Israel's Prime Minister Mr Ariel Sharon for the upsurge in violence.
Other PA officials reiterated their claim that Mr Sharon is intent on bringing down the PA, or at least ending Mr Arafat's rule.
Aides to Mr Sharon said Mr Arafat had opted to pursue "a strategy of terror" - as evidenced by the purchase of weapons on the Karine A arms ship, intercepted by Israel on January 3rd, and by the unprecedented involvement of gunmen from Fatah in attacks inside Israel.
Israel's military intelligence chief, Mr Aharon Ze'evi, warned Israelis that "worse attacks than we have seen to date" were now in prospect.
Meanwhile, Al Jazeera TV has reported from Dubai that American peace envoy Mr Anthony Zinni wants to be relieved of his Middle East peacebroker's mission, since he sees no prospect for achieving a lasting truce.
An Israeli soldier in a tank division died in a machine-gun "accident" yesterday during military operations near the West Bank town of Ramallah, the army said. The soldier died when a heavy machine-gun discharged unintentionally. The army has ordered an investigation.