Herald news services
JERUSALEM — Israeli forces killed three Palestinians on Monday, a day after Yasser Arafat told his people to stop attacks on Israelis. The Palestinians, meanwhile, fired on Israelis and planted bombs.
In a speech Sunday, Arafat charged that Israel had "declared war" on the Palestinians, but characterized attacks against Israelis as "terrorist activity" and called for a cease-fire to end nearly 15 months of conflict.
Israel on Monday kept up its offensive against suspected militants, with its forces killing a leading Hamas activist, Yacoub Aidkadik, 28, in the West Bank city of Hebron. The military said he tried to escape and was shot.
Soldiers opened fire at two armed Palestinians in the West Bank town of Nablus, killing one and wounding the other. Palestinians said they were policemen in an unmarked car.
And in Khan Younis in the Gaza Strip, a 12-year-old boy was shot and killed, a Palestinian doctor said.
Israeli police briefly detained the Palestine Liberation Organization’s most senior official in East Jerusalem, Sari Nusseibeh, a philosophy professor with close ties to many Israeli politicians, which drew criticism from within the government and from opposition leaders as an attack against Palestinian moderates who seek dialogue with Israel.
Some Palestinians, ignoring Arafat’s orders, opened fire and planted bombs in the West Bank and Gaza on Monday. The Israeli military listed a dozen incidents. Three Israelis were wounded in two separate West Bank ambushes, doctors and the military said.
Secretary of State Colin Powell said in Washington that Arafat can expect a positive Israeli response if his call to end violence is carried out. Powell also assured the Palestinian leader that the Bush administration still backs establishment of a Palestinian state.
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