Attacker kills 3 Israeli students

Associated Press

JERUSALEM — A gunman sneaked onto the grounds of an Orthodox Jewish high school in the West Bank late Tuesday and killed three teen-agers, even as Israeli troops continued their daily raids into Palestinian towns.

The man shot and killed three Israeli students outside a high school in the settlement of Itamar, near the Palestinian city of Nablus, settlers and rescue service officials said.

The attacker was shot and killed by the settlement’s security chief.

Hezi Katoa, a rescue service worker, told Israel Radio that they found one student hit by a number of bullets in the chest, and two more "lying behind the building with bullet wounds all over their bodies." All three were dead at the scene, he said.

A few hours earlier, an Israeli motorist was killed and another wounded in a shooting attack, apparently by a Palestinian gunman, near the Jewish settlement of Ofra, said rescue services spokesman Yeruham Mandola.

The violence accompanied repeated Israeli incursions into Palestinian towns in the West Bank, including in-and-out incursions into Jenin and Bethlehem, arresting about a dozen Palestinians.

Late Tuesday, Israeli soldiers entered Beitunia, a suburb of the West Bank town of Ramallah, Palestinians said, and surrounded the house of a prominent Hamas leader. However, the leader, Hassan Yussuf, was not there. The Israeli military had no comment.

In another development, Israel launched the spy satellite Ofek-5, displaying advanced missile capabilities and restoring a military eye in the sky after its last spy satellite burned up in the atmosphere about a year ago.