Israel hunts down militants

By Hadeel Wahdan

Associated Press

RAMALLAH, West Bank — Israeli troops rounded up hundreds of Palestinian men for questioning, battled gunmen and imposed a curfew in the West Bank’s main city Saturday. Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat was penned up in his office, surrounded by Israeli troops and trying to keep up his staff’s morale, aides and witnesses said.

Israel’s military offensive, launched Friday to hunt down militants after a series of Palestinian attacks, will last as long as it takes "to guarantee the safety of our homes," Defense Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer told Israeli television. Eleven Palestinians and two Israelis have been killed in the two days of fighting in Ramallah.

In a new attack, a suicide bomber blew himself up in a crowded cafe in Tel Aviv’s entertainment district Saturday evening, killing himself and wounding at least 32 people, including four who were in serious condition and one in critical condition, police and paramedics said. A militia linked to Arafat’s Fatah movement claimed responsibility.

Two other Palestinians heading into Israel to conduct a suicide attack got into a gunbattle with Israeli police at the edge of the West Bank. An Israeli officer and the two Palestinians were killed.

President Bush said Saturday that he respects Israel’s right to defend itself and demanded that Arafat do more to stem violence.

"I can understand why the Israeli government takes the actions they take. Their country is under attack," Bush said. He said Arafat "can do a lot more" to prevent terrorist attacks.

The Palestinian news agency responded harshly today, criticizing U.S. Mideast envoy Anthony Zinni and warning Arab leaders they could be overthrown for failing to back the Palestinians.

Despite the harsh U.S. words for the Palestinians, Washington supported a U.N. Security Council resolution passed early Saturday that called on Israel to withdraw from Palestinian cities, including Ramallah.

At the same time, Israel’s tense northern border with Lebanon flared up. Hezbollah guerrillas fired rockets and mortar shells at Israeli outposts in a disputed border area, and Israeli warplanes responded with strikes on suspected Hezbollah positions in south Lebanon.

Israel is expected to broaden its offensive in Palestinian-controlled areas in coming days, and the military was in action on two other fronts Saturday.

Tanks rumbled into the Palestinian town of Beit Jalla, just south of Jerusalem and next to Bethlehem, where Christians are observing Easter weekend. Tanks also entered the town of Beituniya, outside Ramallah, surrounding the military compound of West Bank security chief Jibril Rajoub. He said his men would resist an Israeli takeover.

In other military measures, Israeli forces entered Seida, a village near Jenin in the West Bank and killed two Palestinians, one of them an Islamic Jihad activist, villagers said. The Israeli military said Israeli soldiers returned fire from a building, killing two gunmen, and Israeli soldiers left the village after the operation.

Israeli forces in Ramallah fired rockets at a high-rise building, forcing 15 Palestinian gunmen inside to surrender. Several of the gunmen were taken out injured and put in an armored Israeli medical vehicle.

Palestinian witnesses said Israeli forces moving through the streets of Ramallah with loudspeakers demanded that all males between the ages of 14 and 40 come out of their homes and report to a school. More than 500 Palestinian men assembled in the yard and were blindfolded and had their hands tied behind their backs. Some were being put on a truck and driven away. The army chased away journalists who arrived at the scene.

The military said it has arrested a total of 145 suspected Palestinian militants during the two-day operation, including more than 60 who were detained Friday in Arafat’s compound. It denied carrying out mass detentions despite multiple witness accounts by journalists. In previous raids of West Bank towns, Israeli troops rounded up more than 1,000 Palestinians in a similar fashion.